New Stuff

Resources for Your Developer Toolbox

Theresa W. Carey

Contents

Presentation Layer Toolset
Bidirectional Data Synchronization
Plot, Compute, Interpret, and Embed
Design and Distribute Reports
Web-based Collaboration Server
Serial Comm Toolkit for .NET
Transition Legacy Apps in .NET
Database Designer
The Bookshelf

Presentation Layer Toolset

Infragistics is shipping NetAdvantage 2004 Volume 1, a toolset for developing commercial-quality user interfaces for the Microsoft® .NET Framework, ASP.NET, Tablet PC, and COM. NetAdvantage 2004 Volume 1 features Windows® Forms and ASP.NET components that resemble the Outlook® 2003 interface for both the Microsoft .NET Framework explorer bar and scheduling elements.

NetAdvantage 2004 Volume 1 also features data input elements for ASP.NET. Several elements are compliant with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act for the visually impaired, including the ASP.NET menu, tree and grid, and the Windows Forms grid, toolbars, and editors.

Additional features include new chart types for .NET and ASP.NET charting, and enhancements to the ASP.NET presentation layer framework. Subscribers receive all source code for .NET and ASP.NET designers and elements. You'll also find tabs, explorer bars, menus, listbars, trees, a dock manager, UI and editing elements, and more.

https://www.infragistics.com

Bidirectional Data Synchronization

MaXware International AS has released MaXware ExpresSync, a one-to-one data synchronization tool that enables enterprises to manage ongoing information integration demands by securely moving data between any two repositories or applications, independent of platform, protocol, type, or location. The product offers bidirectional synchronization capabilities and the ability to manipulate data in transfer. The MaXware ExpresSync data processing engine is designed to efficiently process large amounts of data, which results in more rapid and efficient data integration across the enterprise. Additional features include a graphical user interface, support for JavaScript, VBScript, and PERL, and the ability to create audit trails to keep track of changes down to the attribute level.

ExpresSync also includes a proprietary delta mechanism that is intended to ensure that updated data is written to the target repositories, thus eliminating the need to update all the data every time synchronization takes place. The result is a reduction in the write load of the target system. To reduce the read load on the source system, ExpresSync can utilize existing change-log features of directory servers or add triggers to SQL Server™ databases to achieve the same functionality. Note that ExpresSync provides support for SSL/TLS for encryption.

https://www.maxware.com

Plot, Compute, Interpret, and Embed

SoftIntegration Inc. recently announced the availability of Ch 4.5 and Embedded Ch 4.5. Ch is a C/C++ interpreter for cross-platform scripting, 2D/3D plotting, numerical computing, shell programming, and embedded scripting. Product enhancements include C++ features, file name completion using a tab key in command shell, easier interface with binary C/C++ libraries and embedded scripting, and bug fixes.

Ch supports 1999 ISO C Standard (C99) and C++ classes. Ch also supports many industry standards with over 8,000 functions. Functions in static or dynamical binary C/C++ libraries can be executed interpretively in scripting without recompilation using the Ch SDK.

Ch shell is a C-compatible shell while C shell (csh) is a C-like shell. Ch is an interpretive implementation of C, similar to Unix and MS-DOS® shells. Ch in Windows includes over 100 Unix commands for portable shell programming. Ch can also be used as a login shell just like sh, csh, and ksh. Ch has built-in 2D/3D plotting support, generic mathematical functions, computational arrays for linear algebra and matrix computations, and advanced high-level numerical functions for linear systems, differential equation solving, Fourier analysis, and curve fitting. Ch SDK 4.5 can integrate the existing C/C++ libraries as part of the Ch scripting module. Functions and classes in C/C++ static or dynamic libraries can be invoked either in a Ch script file or in a Ch command shell.

Embedded Ch allows users to embed Ch into other C/C++ applications and hardware. With Embedded Ch, C/C++ applications can be extended with all features of Ch. It allows execution of C/C++ scripts generated dynamically online. Ch is available for Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, Solaris, and HP-UX.

https://www.softintegration.com

Design and Distribute Reports

Business Objects, which recently acquired Crystal Decisions, has announced its newest suite of products, Crystal Version 10. The suite combines Crystal Enterprise, an enterprise reporting platform, with the report design capabilities of Crystal Analysis and Crystal Reports.

The product suite includes greater user interactivity and tighter integration with Microsoft Office, application integration options with a new Java report engine, advanced controls for developers using Visual Studio® .NET, increased performance and scalability, as well as large-scale administration capabilities, and a new architecture for data access.

In conjunction with the launch, Business Objects is also introducing two new professional accreditation programs, Crystal Enterprise Certified Professional (CECP) program and the Crystal Reports Certified Professional (CRCP) program, to maximize an organization's effectiveness when deploying Crystal Version 10.

https://www.businessobjects.com

Web-based Collaboration Server

Akiva has announced the availability of WebBoard 7.0, a Web-based collaboration server. WebBoard 7.0 includes features that track recent trends in online collaboration including blogging, RSS/XML feeds (inbound and outbound), calendaring, polling, message ratings, and a SOAP (Web services) interface.

Other WebBoard features include Web-based discussion forums, e-mail discussion lists, News (NNTP) discussions, instant messaging, chat rooms, and whiteboards. WebBoard has integrated all of these tools into one Windows-based server, which provides access control, moderation, reporting, searching, and customization.

WebBoard is used within education and corporate environments to create virtual classrooms, for internal project collaboration, for establishing standards and best practices, and for customer support applications. The new XML and SOAP interfaces enable integration of the product into other enterprise applications.

https://www.akiva.com

Serial Comm Toolkit for .NET

ComponentScience Inc. has released TransPort, a serial communications toolkit for the .NET Framework. TransPort, written in C#, handles situations as simple as reading a serial port or as complex as handling a file transfer through protocols such as XModem, YModem, and ZModem.

Features include multithreaded access to any of the computer's physical and virtual COM ports on any bus (including USB), a drop and go Winsock port for multithreaded, asynchronous access to the TCP/IP layer, and real-time, regex-based DataPackets which provide flexible handling of information received over a serial or Winsock port.

TransPort also includes RAS client support to establish, manage, and control remote network connections, TTY emulation for real-time, user-driven interaction, and the ability to monitor and manage telephony devices via TAPI.

https://www.componentscience.net

Transition Legacy Apps in .NET

Visible Systems Corporation recently unveiled the next iteration of its tool, Visible Developer 3.3, designed to help companies build enterprise-wide applications using Visual Studio .NET 2003.

Visible Developer 3.3 works within the Visual Studio .NET IDE to automatically generate more than 90 percent of the business logic and database access code in Visual Basic .NET and Visual C#® .NET directly from the application model. You can extract database schema information (tables, fields, data types, keys, and so on) from your existing databases through an interface to Visible Analyst or using an XML document interface.

Databases including Microsoft Access, SQL Server, Oracle, and others are supported. Software design and implementation details are contained in code patterns. You design the business application and then select the code pattern. Visible Developer generates code matching the requirements expressed in your model. Patterns exist for C#, Visual Basic .NET, Visual Basic 6.0 three-tier business objects, Visual Basic forms, SQL Server and Oracle stored procedures, ASP, and ASP.NET.

https://www.visible.com

Database Designer

Datanamic has released DeZign for Databases 3.1, a database development tool using an entity relationship diagram. DeZign for Databases visually supports the layout of entities and relationships and automatically generates most SQL and desktop databases.

Some of the new features in version 3.1 include the support of views, which can be created using a query builder, adding options to an index, and exporting SQL Server comments on tables and columns to the SQL script. Version 3.1 of the application now uses the new DBISAM components so that DBISAM V4 tables can be created.

DeZign for Databases runs on Win32® platforms including Windows NT® (versions 3.51 and 4.0) and Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows 2000, and Windows XP. DeZign for Databases supports SQL Server, Access, Oracle, MySQL, Interbase, Sybase, DB2, Paradox, FoxPro, Clipper, PostgreSQL, Firebird, DBISAM, Advantage DB, and Pervasive SQL.

https://www.datanamic.com/dezign

The Bookshelf

Addison-Wesley has published Extending MFC Applications with the .NET Framework by Tom Archer and Nishant Sivakumar, aimed at experienced MFC programmers. This book teaches traditional Windows-based developers how to incorporate .NET functionality into their applications. Instead of publishing another .NET book that attempts to move MFC developers to .NET, this book focuses on showing how to combine MFC with .NET to improve productivity. Highlights include practical examples that show how to incorporate .NET functionality into legacy applications as well as help in preparing developers for "Longhorn," the code name for the next major release of Windows. An accompanying CD-ROM includes the code from all the samples in the book.

https://www.aw-bc.com

InstallShield Software Corporation recently released Practical Windows Installer Solutions for Building InstallShield Setup Applications, providing expert techniques for creating customized software installations. Written by Windows Installer expert Bob Baker, the book provides a real-world guide to help developers overcome obstacles that can crop up during installation authoring and application deployment.

Topics include delving into how the Windows Installer service manipulates Windows security to provide elevated privileges to packages targeting locked-down desktops, and how to overcome the access issues involved in deploying software to locked-down environments. You'll also learn how to use Windows Installer custom actions to extend installations, how to create installations that are easy to update, and how to upgrade applications using full installation packages. There's a section detailing how to generate and apply patches, and information regarding the installation of Plug and Play device drivers.

https://www.installshield.com/ispress

Send your New Stuff to Theresa at  newstuff@microsoft.com.

Theresa W. Carey is a freelance writer who lives in California. Her byline has appeared in Barron's and PC World.