Powerbuilder 12.5 Crack
Demetrius Dade
We've recently started to support a PowerBuilder 10.5 application and the question has come whether or not we should think about alternatives or keep the app running in PB 10.5. It is a classic PB app; an administrative software, build upon an Oracle DB.
I'm wondering what the pro's & con's are of trying to update the current 10.5 version to the latest version. Is it worth it to update? Or what are the pro's & con's of sticking to the 10.5 version?
However, since you've said that you're planning on moving it forward, you might want to consider that 10.5 doesn't support current operating systems (within a year, Windows systems currently supported by MS will be only Win8 and Win10), which were nothing but figments of imagination when 10.5 was out. Your 10.5 app may work on Win10 now, but that's solely because of MS's work on backward compatibility for apps, and that you haven't leveraged an area in PB that had a problem in a then-future version of Windows. If you need to add functionality, being on a version that at least suggests that it works on your operating system could be helpful.
Parallel argument for databases, the exception being that if your app uses SQL Anywhere, the database that used to come for free in several PB packages. It is now something you'd have to purchase separately.
One thing to remember about trying to move forward with an old version of anything is support. If you get stuck, the vendor will basically not talk to you, and the peer community has been shrinking, so you've got less chance of getting into a dialog with fellow developers.
Upgrading: Upgrading is usually a minor effort. The most frequent reasons I've seen exceptions to this: deprecated functionality, and coding that depends on behaviours that didn't stay consistent between versions (some behaviours are promised to stay consistent, but not all). Run a migration test with a trail version with your PB expert to get that question off the table.
One thing to keep in mind when upgrading is that the licensing model has changed. PB used to have a perpetual model (buy once, use forever), but it's now a subscription model. Whether this is an improvement for you or not is up to you to figure out.
"Migrating": I've put "migrating" in quotes, because I don't believe there's a technology that lets you "migrate" in the sense of a code translation. (I'll let you read one of my old tirades about wanting to "migrate" off PB.) What I'll talk about here is rewriting in a new technology. Both pulling business rules out of an old PB system and redesigning/rewriting in another technology is a big effort.
The biggest argument in favour these days is getting and keeping PowerBuilder talent. Getting people with PB under their belt is hard, and judging legitimate talent is challenging, even with someone with PB on your side of the interview table. (Leverage your retiring guy if you want to move forward with PB.) Training someone with PB is no small task either. Someone once asked me, not an educator, if I could come up with a course and train his team in a week. I laughed. After a two week course designed and given by professional educators from the then-vendor Powersoft, I came home and wrote incredibly embarrassing code. I also needed lots of time practicing, and getting feedback from my peers. If you can get someone or train someone, if they are only doing PB work a couple of weeks per year, those PB "muscles" will atrophy. No matter the technical arguments of PB vs something else, if you can't get PB talent to maintain it, PB is a dead end.
I'm afraid I'm not one to suggest an alternative technology. It used to be that, in terms of of rich client apps, you couldn't go wrong with choosing Microsoft, but since then, MS has sent the development community on some wild goose chases, that have ended in deprecated technologies. I wouldn't want to be the guy looking into the future to guess.
I would recommend migrating.You will find several companies that offer migration to both java and .net which are the leading platforms.In terms of UI for me currently the only option is web. Using other technologies does not make a lot of sense.If your company uses a lot of MS stack, like MS OS, SQL server. Exchange, Sharepoint etc I will recommend migrating to C# otherwise migrating to Java makes more sense
One major feature of PowerBuilder 2019 is a C# DataStore (compatible with .NET Core) and DataWindow object migration utility. The C# DataStore has the same APIs and transaction mechanism as the PowerScript DataStore. It is documented in detail on the Appeon Website: _online_help/powerbuilder/api_reference/PowerBuilder.Data/DataStore/IDataStore/IDataStore.html
Should you decide C# is the way to go, this feature of PowerBuilder 2019 makes the migration effort a "port" of the PowerScript non-visual code rather than a rewrite (for the reasons mentioned above).
People have been saying for 25 years PB is going to die and it has survived because of this tiny leftover group doing just maintenance projects. This tiny group of passionate PB developers are going to retire in a few years from now - for sure. Maybe companies will find replacements with difficulty and paying even more (due to shortage of skilled PB developers) but those new hires will be more or less in the same age group who are about to retire in a couple of years too. It is like prolonging a patient's life with medications with no permanent cure but only imminent death with painful side-effects. Sure, PowerBuilder apps can last 100+ years but who is going to be there around to support PB apps - even a few years from now (leave alone 100+ years)? On the other hand, futuristic languages that were born to live in the cloud such as Java, C# will be around for much longer than 100 years with a vibrant and ACTIVE developer community still around to support them. PB may not have died in 25 years but just one generation change of PB developers and PB's death is imminent. There will be a dire attrition of PB developers soon - it is just a matter of time. Appeon's profits will prolly go down resulting in increase in license subscription fees. I don't know of any other technology that has this weird/bizarre situation.
1) Offer a free Community version of PowerBuilder (it's a shame there is still none so far for all its powerful, rapid development and cost-effective features). Virtually, every other technology has free community editions of their software except PB. What will Appeon lose by offering a limited free version of PB? A free version will only gain more traction and add more to their bottom-line. Who is going to "buy" PB spending $$ these gloomy days of PB - and also learn it these days? Why would anyone do it?? There are less than 10 PowerBuilder jobs in the whole of USA and this has been same the pathetic situation for years now! The addition of killer features like PowerClient, PowerServer, SnapDevelop, PowerScript Migrator, integration with C# and .NET, Themes, Ribbon Bar, etc. have not changed its situation in the job market at all - not one bit - which is proof enough that employers are not interested in PB anymore (and obviously nobody is interested in learning PB newly). Companies and developers who left PB for good decades ago ain't coming back! We cannot ride on a boat that relies only on jobs "maintaining" existing legacy apps.
2) Bring back the Certifications. Every other technology has certifications except PB. There used to be Certified PowerBuilder Developer (CPD)'s from Powersoft and Sybase decades ago (when PowerBuilder was RULING the market and heck, there even used to be a pbjobs.com job board too exclusively for PB jobs) but not anymore - they were gone a long time ago! Grab the course materials from Sybase, update and add more to it, collaborate with universities like Western Governors University and others, offer PowerBuilder as a course track in addition to the C# and Java tracks they already have in Software Development degree programs. WGU is a huge online-only university churning out thousands of students every year, unlike traditional offline universities that can only churn out in dozens maybe. We can only imagine the amount of exposure PB can get from such strategic partnerships.
You could offer separate course tracks as Intro-level with PowerBuilder, PowerClient during year 1 and Advanced-level with PFC, PowerServer, SnapDevelop, PowerScript Migrator, C#, etc. during year 2. There is so much that can be done to safeguard PB's future before it is too late -
Unless PB is offered as a free Community edition and introduced at the University levels exposing students (future developers) to it, there is not much scope for PB's future and no amount of life-support could save it (I had to select "Critical" as the Priority for this topic to emphasize the importance of this matter). Currently, only Java, C#, C++, Python and JavaScript are offered at colleges/universities and these languages are flourishing for a reason! How can Appeon expect a positive outcome by not doing what others are doing?
I'm about to retire and hand over the PB source code to my clients. They are going to struggle to find a PB developer to support them going forward. I thought that I would use the migration tool to convert to .NET and give them that source...
1. PB documentation, best practices even samples are almost in same condition as before. That is shame, because after those years there is not where to learn, how to develop modern app in PB. I'm not talking about PB Server, because my interest is modern dektop app with DB behind it. I'm not talking about UI. Our customers are satisfied with "old" look and feel and they do not want UI as M$Office has nor webapp. They have quiet large forms in old PB app and they like it. I'm talking about modern design principles, separation of coserns, .... unit testing, .... Our old app is mess of hard to maintain code and this cannot attract any young dev.
b37509886e