Re: selecting a language
- From: Gerbrand van Dieijen <twistedmnd@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 06 Jun 2005 12:45:54 +0200
mpinsley@xxxxxxxxx schreef:
> We are a software company that provides Inventory & Procurement
> mangement to the hospitality industry. For the past twenty years we
> have been using Progress Software as both the development language and
> the underlying database. We are in the process of exploring new
> languages to write our application in, as Progress is becoming
> expensive for us.
>
> Here are some of our issues
>
> 1. Progress is a 4GL language so it is very rapid development. We would
> like something that is as fast or faster
>
A great advantage of Java or any 3GL OO language is, that you can very
well created structructed, modular code. It's much easier to seperate
business-logic, database access from GUI code.
This may seem slower at first but the great advantage is that your much
better reuse existing code. Also it is easier to (automatically) test
software. If your project is to be developed and maintained for a long
time, this is a must.
> 2. We would like to be somewhat database agnostic but we are leaning
> towards using MS SQL - Progress was an embedded database so it was very
> easy to maintain (any suggestions here...are there other good embedded
> databases)
Even a 4GL enviroment (at least like Progress) won't free you from the
need to create a good database design, or optimilizations like indices.
> 3. We will probably (Eventually) be creating web services. It would be
> nice if once we learn a language that we could easily use that language
> to both CREATE webservices as well as use them (once again rapid
> development is important)
>
Java has a lot of built in support for it. You could use something like
webmethods (http://www.webmethods.com) too (I never used it).
> 4. Since we were using a 4GL lanaguage we are looking for tools that
> will help us with a lot of the code development (suggestions? I have
> seen YesSoftware and it looks pretty good)
>
I use JBuilder, sometimes combined with Dreamweaver.
> 5. We want something that is OO and runs quickly
>
I'd say it is more important the code is robust and scaleable.
> 6. Our current app is developed in a rich GUI interface. It is similar
> in nature to an applet where only the Form that is required is
> downloaded to the clients local machine. Otherwise everything remains
> on the server (thus making it easy to send updates to our clients). Can
> we develop in a way that we can eaisly provide both a rich interface as
> well as a web interface?
>
Yes, DHTML gives you a lot possibilities nowadays. You could look at the
various Google applications like gmail and googlemaps.
> 8. There seems to be a large community of Jave users (is that correct).
> Are there a number of user groups in the US?
>
All people (involved in developing) that I speak face to face live
within 100 kilometers of my home. For all other people that I 'speak', I
don't care if they live 200 kilometers or 2000 kilometers away.
Anyway, also in Europe Java is big.
> 9. We will eventually be providing multi-language capabilities...does
> Java support this?
>
Do you mean multiple spoken languages? Java has good support for this.
> 10. We need a language that is easy to learn and can provide us with
> good connections to databases
>
JDO would be a very good option in my opionion.
I use JDOGenie. It is very easy to use.
Using JDO, you can use Java-objects that are stored and loaded from a
database transparantly.
Manually entering SQL code isn't needed.
Also JDOGenie (as well as other JDO-implementations) are a lot cheaper
than Progress, although they do a much better job to my opinion.
> 11. What are the posatives and negatives of using Java?
>
I'd say, search the web and google.
> 12. If you were chosing between C#, Java and PHP which one would you go
> with and why (good and bad of both)
>
Well, considering the newsgroup I'd see Java, but I wouldn't rule out C#.
> 13. We are interested in cross platform capabilities. Today most of our
> customers use Windows, so this is not a critical feature, but since you
> never know exactly what the futre brings it would be nice to go either
> way
When you create a DHTML (webinterface) to your application, this
wouldn't matter.
> 14. Does anyone know of a web based open source inventory managment or
> ERP application? Something with a lot of depth to it that is currently
> being used in a manufacturing environment?
>
You could search http://www.freshmeat.net or http://www.sourceforge.net
However, if you want to have an ERP application: rather than developing
your self, you can use existing ERP applications like Exact, SAP,
Naviles, etc.
Although this may seem more expensive first, eventually it will be a lot
cheaper than developing, maintaining and supporting your own application.
> Any insight you can provide on selecting the next language for us would
> be appreciated. Also we need to take in to consideration the total cost
> of deploying the application, including webservers, datbases, etc.
>
> This is a big decision for us, so I appologize for such a lenghty post.
>
.
- References:
- selecting a language
- From: mpinsley
- selecting a language
- Prev by Date: Re: jTDS driver
- Next by Date: Re: vector removeElementAt removes every second element
- Previous by thread: Re: selecting a language
- Next by thread: Contract work
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
