Home » Developer & Programmer » Forms » General Forms Discussion: ease of use, future of Forms
| General Forms Discussion: ease of use, future of Forms [message #112408] |
Thu, 24 March 2005 18:30  |
scottwmackey
Messages: 515
Registered: March 2005
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Senior Member |
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I understand that this topic is becoming completely irrelevant but I am dying to know exactly what kind of problems people are having with Forms. What is a specific example of a problem that you have had with Forms that you would not have had with some other front-end development tool? So far none have been offered. I think it is interesting to note that, contrary to Steve's inference, the problems William noted have nothing to do with Forms. You would have to follow those procedures regardless of the front-end tool you were using to develop. "Methodical" applies to this profession, not a specific tool.
I would like to back up what William said. I have been using Forms for about 8 years now and I have never experience a time in which "just doesn't work." If you really have had no problems working with VB against a database in the past, just make sure you are following the same procedures you have always followed. I guarantee you that if you drop a table, rebuild it, and fail to commit, your data would not come up in a VB created form either. If you have to work with Forms and you want to make your life easier, I would suggest changing your paradigm. Stop assuming that Forms is just intermittantly failing. It's not. Pay attention to what YOU are doing and make sure you are following established practices.
PS: I have a related question to the VB advocates. Let's say you have a couple of hundred end users who are using the form you developed. You need to change the form. How do you distribute those changes to the end users? (This is not a rhetorical question to prove a point. I really have no idea.)
[Updated on: Thu, 24 March 2005 18:42] Report message to a moderator |
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| Re: what happen if table is rebuilt [message #112444 is a reply to message #112408] |
Fri, 25 March 2005 08:29  |
Steve Corey
Messages: 336
Registered: February 2005
Location: RI
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Senior Member |
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Scott -
You're rhetorical question has absolutely nothing to do with the use and design of applications, so for the purposes of this discussion, your point is completely irrelavent. I understand that you are an advocate and you like the tool. That's great! 8 years will definately give you a comfort level with the tool, no doubt about it. To be honest, I haven't used VB that much, but from what I have used it for, I like the fact that objects behave the way you expect, namely because you get to define the behavior. For example, to call a method or set a property you simply identify the object, delimit, then call the method or property like so:
MyCard.MyProperty = 5
or
MyCard.Shuffle
done. Once you define the methods and property validations, developing an application is a piece of cake. With Forms, I don't think it is such. Oracle has defined all of the properties and methods and have determined which ones will be accessible to the developer. The in-application help, IMO, is extremely lean and not very insightful as naming conventions for objects/classes/and methods have been pre-determined and to me, that lack of control is a drawback.
In any event, I am not in the process of developing a form at this point in time, but I do have a project coming up. If you would like, I will private message you every time an error occurs due to illogical behavior or otherwise. In other words, I'll let you know every time I think Forms is acting in a manner that is counter-productive to development.
Perhaps you are right that it is my inexperience with the Oracle standards that makes me feel frustrated with the product. Perhaps in time, or 8 years, I'll be echoing what you are saying today. But as of right now, that isn't how I feel and I will defend my points as I think they are valid.
Regards,
Steve
WAR erring on the side of speed
WAR Project Fusion
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| Re: what happen if table is rebuilt [message #112445 is a reply to message #112444] |
Fri, 25 March 2005 08:51 |
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Maaher
Messages: 7065
Registered: December 2001
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Senior Member |
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I serously doubt that Forms will continue to exist as a separate product. Already, Oracle is pushing JDev and Portal. Little or no enhancements are done to Forms, Graphics Builder has been taken out of the IDS, Forms is going 3tier only...who's to tell what's next (and when)...
If you want I split the topic and move it to a more appropriate place. Just let me know...
Interesting discussion.
MHE
[Updated on: Fri, 25 March 2005 08:51] Report message to a moderator |
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| Re: what happen if table is rebuilt [message #112447 is a reply to message #112408] |
Fri, 25 March 2005 08:54 |
Steve Corey
Messages: 336
Registered: February 2005
Location: RI
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Senior Member |
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Maaher -
I agree with you, Oracle does not. They keep saying how they are going to continue with it as part of DS in the future, but I have my concerns on the the quality of the revisions and/or integration with new features.
I would recommend moving the topic, but since it is not my own, I suppose that is up to sshan. Sorry to hi-jack your thread man!
Regards,
Steve
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| Re: what happen if table is rebuilt [message #112491 is a reply to message #112444] |
Fri, 25 March 2005 18:33 |
scottwmackey
Messages: 515
Registered: March 2005
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Senior Member |
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Steve,
Please, if you will, refrain from projecting motives into my questions and responses. Nevermind that, do what ever floats your boat. Have at it. But just for the record, I am not an advocate of anything in particular. I could really care less if anybody likes Forms. I don't own any stock in the company. As far as I am concerned, a tool is a tool is a tool. I have yet to come across a mature development tool that wasn't designed reasonably well, i.e. I can be reasonably productive with it. I am tempted to drop this whole thing right now because I really have no emotional stake with the tool whatsoever. I do, however, have an unhealthy obsession with truth for truth's sake which kind of compels me to respond.
First, my question was not rhetorical. I was making no "point", so it kind of can't be "completely irrelavent." You seem to have inferred exactly the opposite of what I said. Hmm. I don't know how I can be any clearer. But based on the perceived harshness of your response, should I assume that distributing the form is not easy?
Second, it took me about four hours, not eight years, to get comfortable developing with Forms. My reference to eight years was with regards to Forms' consistent behavior, not its development learning curve. I have reread my post, and I am struggling to see how you could have inferred otherwise.
Third, your example still has nothing to do with developing a form for the sole purpose of modifying data in a database, which is Forms' only reason for existence. You're correct that you cannot set Forms objects. So what? Like I said, I have been doing this for eight years and haven't needed to do it so far. It almost sounds to me like you are criticizing and apple for not being an orange.
Fourth, I would certainly like to hear whatever problems you have with Forms in your future development, just because I am curious. I have no intention of defending the tool.
Fifth, I don't think it is your inexperience with the tool that is the problem. If anything (and I am going out on a limb here), I would guess it is your inexperience with life that is the source of most of your reaction. The level of certainty and absoluteness implied through your use of language leads me to believe that you are in your early twenties. I remember what it was like to believe that I, and only I, knew the way everything should be, and that everything or anybody that wasn't that way was just stupid.
Lastly, I was just trying to pass on some hard earned wisdom (wink, wink) to sshan. I have wasted far more than my share of time being disgusted with a tool or technology because it wasn't behaving as I expected (or as I would have designed it) only to discover that I did something completely stupid like not commit the transaction or follow clearly documented instructions. In every case, if I would have simply stopped for a moment and asked myself, "What am I (with emphasis on I) doing wrong here?", I could have saved myself hours of frustration. Accept the idea that the tool, if it is mature, is never the problem, and I would bet you will be much happier and more productive.
Or not.
Scott
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| Re: General Forms Discussion: ease of use, future of Forms [message #112637 is a reply to message #112408] |
Mon, 28 March 2005 08:32 |
Steve Corey
Messages: 336
Registered: February 2005
Location: RI
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Senior Member |
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Scott -
I did mis-read your post and for that I apologize. I am not trying to start a fight with you, I am just trying to defend my stance. I also was not attempting to respond harshly, as I read your post to say "this IS a rhetorical question", but your assumption is correct, distributing would not be as easy as with a Forms application. The reference to being irrelevant was the fact that I have been discussing application development not necessarily being database driven. Maybe this is where we are not connecting? In any event, I guess you could categorize my gripe with Forms as it does not allow object manipulation at a level I am comfortable with. As time goes on, I am able to as you say, put the onus on myself to figure out ways to achieve the desired behavior. Maybe it was naive of me to think I could just pick up a tool and it would follow the standards, or at least what I perceived to be standards, of object behavior (again not database related).
Furthermore, when I stated that there was a 'dumb limitation', I meant that in the smallest scope possible in the context of only what I stated. You say it is easy to have code be executed in a enter-query | execute-query code block, but I have yet to have success with this method. Is it me, is it you, it only matters, in the end, if you can get your application to obtain the desired results. My 'absolute language' is in the context of this thread and this thread only. I am not trying to be difficult or project my motives unto anybody else, I am merely expressing my opinion. You and I are in a difference of opinion and that is fine! You have a good point about accepting the tool, but I think we may differ on the definition of 'mature'.
Anyway, I would like to hear your feedback on problems I encounter on my next project if you would hear them. The bottom line here is that we learn something and perhaps you are right, I need to learn more about Forms and I am out of line here. But as far as I can judge by this forum, OTN, and MetaLink many users have difficulty with Forms and the users that can pick it up in four hours are few and far between.
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