[ANN] The ELJ Project announces ELJ 0.5; Open Source Projects for Eiffel
Greg Compestine
Contact: u...@elj.com
THE ELJ PROJECT ANNOUNCES THE RELEASE OF ELJ 0.5, OPEN SOURCE PROJECTS
AND LIBRARY BINDINGS FOR EIFFEL
Germany -- November 9, 2002. The ELJ Project is pleased to announce the
release of version 0.5, bringing extensive Linux support to the project.
Additions:
* WX_SASH_WINDOW
* WX_SASH_LAYOUT_WINDOW
* Z_*_STREAM compression classes, with example
* BZ_*_STREAM compression classes, with example
* WX_WIZARD, related classes, with example
* WX_MINI_FRAME
* WX_CALCULATE_LAYOUT_EVENT
* WX_LAYOUT_ALGORITHM
* WX_QUERY_LAYOUT_EVENT
* Upgraded Scintilla binding to version 1.48
* Upgraded SQLite binding to version 2.7.2
* Added controller concept (and related classes)
* EWX_DATE_PICKER
* EWX_TIME_PICKER
* WX_CALENDAR_DATE_ATTRIBUTE
Improvements:
* Class documentation improved to where 'short'form
is meaningful.
* commented examples to make them more useful
* Numerous bug fixes
* Enhanced WX_APP_BASE
* enhanced WX_WINDOW
* C++ code is now Ansi C++ compatible
Changes:
* Now using GOBO's version of regular expressions
(The ELJ version will no longer be supported.)
The ELJ Project supports several applications, relational databases,
native libraries and bindings to popular APIs. We are actively seeking
Linux talent to help with such issues as generating RPMs and improving
portability.
Applications:
* ELJ GIRLS -- a CRM, especially for software companies, based on
wxWindows and Firebird. http://www.sf.net/projects/elj-girls
* SeBench -- an IDE for SmallEiffel. (part of the ELJ project)
Also included in the downloads are:
* XmlViewer -- based on ELJ and Gobo
* Numerous examples for the wxWindows and database bindings.
Native Libraries:
* Perlish -- a library that provides some Perl functionality to
Eiffel programs
Database Interfaces:
* Firebird http://firebird.sourceforge.net
* Berkely DB (SleepyCat) http://www.sleepycat.com
* MySQL http://www.mysql.com
* PostgreSQL http://www.postgresql.com
* SQLite http://www.sqlite.org
GUI/OS Support:
* Win32 API (eljWin32api)
* wxWindows (wxEiffel) http://www.wxwindows.org
* OpenGL (proof of concept only)
Compression:
* zlib http://www.gzip.org/zlib/
* bzip2 http://sources.redhat.com/bzip2/
The ELJ project is actively developing SmallEiffel bindings to various
databases and GUI libraries. Geoff Eldridge, the founder of ELJ, likes
Eiffel for it's clear syntax and semantics, and the self-documenting
aspects of Eiffel contracts that reduces his need for reference
materials. "So I am self-contained in my code development and hence have
more time to think about the problem and its solution." Geoff also
believes that DbC "is just brilliant. Once you have experienced DbC you
feel exposed with other languages without the facility." Geoff also
finds Eiffel to be very malleable, even though it is a statically typed
language.
Uwe Sander, the workhorse of the ELJ project who is currently writing
much of the code, agrees. "Design and development are closely related
when working with Eiffel, not strictly separated foes." Uwe also
appreciates SmallEiffel's support for interfacing to C and C++. "The
integration with existing C code is now much better than it is in any
other language I know, including C++. You can easily mess up a C++
project and let the old C style rule the project. Such a thing will
never happen in an Eiffel project. It is always clear which language
contains the top level logic."
The ELJ GIRLS project is a successful example of a medium size
application built with SmallEiffel and the ELJ libraries. It proves that
the principle of DbC and Eiffel inheritence, combined with a subset of
the currently available libraries, is the right way to achieve
applications with good runtime performance, few errors with reduced
testing time, and source that is very easy to extend.
Geoff Eldridge, notes that the ELJ Project is now two years old. "We
have come a long way over the last two years. The project has been very
fruitful in acheiving it's stated goal of bringing much-needed
functionality to SmallEiffel developers. The project is seeing a growing
base of users that are taking advantage of SmallEiffel and the
functionality offered by the ELJ and GOBO projects. As the libraries are
stablising, our efforts are now focusing on the important documentation
and marketing processes. We look forward to seeing where the ELJ project
will be in another two years time."
For more information about the ELJ project, visit:
http://elj.sourceforge.net
For more about the SmallEiffel compiler, visit:
http://smalleiffel.loria.fr
For more on the Gobo project, visit:
http://www.gobosoft.com
Other Eiffel resources include the Eiffel Discussion Board on
http://www.eiffelforum.org/
Visit the IRC channel for eiffel, named #eiffel on
irc.openprojects.net
Comp.lang.eiffel at Google Groups:
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&group=comp.lang.eiffel
Cetus Links:
http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_eiffel.html
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