Hi,

I'm looking for Marketing data on how application(home grown
application not
packaged application) that is written on top of Informix interact with
the
database.
I assume it can be one of the following options :

OLEDB\ODBC\JDBC\ADO.NET
4GL
ESQL\C

I'm interested to know what is the most common way for the application
to be
built.

Thanks,

Gil

On Mon, 2006-09-25 at 20:41, Gil Lapid wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm looking for Marketing data on how application(home grown
> application not
> packaged application) that is written on top of Informix interact with
> the
> database.
> I assume it can be one of the following options :
>
> OLEDB\ODBC\JDBC\ADO.NET
> 4GL
> ESQL\C

There's also ESQL/J (the Java equivalent of ESQL/C), ESQL/Cobol (if
anybody still uses that) and a C++ library. According to the
documentation it's also possible to build client applications using the
libmi datablade API, but I don't know anybody that has done so.

Some programming languages support Informix connectivity using
third-party modules that use some of the above under the hood. PHP and
Python have Informix modules that are implemented in ESQL/C, and I
believe the Perl module is also implemented in ESQL/C. Even though these
modules are implemented in ESQL/C, the programmer is shielded from that
and doesn't use ESQL/C per se.

> I'm interested to know what is the most common way for the application
> to be
> built.

The plural of "anecdote" is not "data", but here goes. I use primarily
Informix 4GL (and derivatives/successors), some PHP, and whenever I can,
I use Python. The mix is probably 95% 4GL, 3% PHP, and 2% Python.

Hope this helps,

Carsten.

> > OLEDB\ODBC\JDBC\ADO.NET
> > 4GL
> > ESQL\C
> Some programming languages support Informix connectivity using
> third-party modules that use some of the above under the hood. PHP and
> Python have Informix modules that are implemented in ESQL/C,

Yep.

> > I'm interested to know what is the most common way for the application
> > to be
> > built.
> The plural of "anecdote" is not "data", but here goes. I use primarily
> Informix 4GL (and derivatives/successors), some PHP, and whenever I can,
> I use Python. The mix is probably 95% 4GL, 3% PHP, and 2% Python.

1. Lots of PHP on intranet/extranet sites using PHP's Informix support.
2. Some .NET apps using ODBC connections ('native' .NET connectivity
only available on Win32. We use these when we want either a local
client or PHP performance just sucks too much for the task [ putting on
flame retardant suit now to protect myself from wild-eyed unshaven PHP
fundamentalists - probably the biggest drawback to using PHP ].
3. JDBC from workflow engine. Do things in workflow engines count as
applications?
4. We have a bunch of old 4GL apps (Ick!!!). We occasionally have to
modify them [fragile little bastards] but I'd never develop anything new
in that environment.

Adam Williams said:
> 4. We have a bunch of old 4GL apps (Ick!!!). We occasionally have to
> modify them [fragile little bastards] but I'd never develop anything new
> in that environment.

Bollocks. You can have bad code in any environment. I still, to this day,
have not found a programming language as productive for solving business
problems as Informix-4GL.

--
Bye now,
Obnoxio

"... no bill is required as no value was provided."
-- Christine Normile

--
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by OpenProtect(http://www.openprotect.com), and is
believed to be clean.

Obnoxio The Clown wrote:
>
> Bollocks. You can have bad code in any environment. I still, to this day,
> have not found a programming language as productive for solving business
> problems as Informix-4GL.
>
But you stubbornly refuse to learn perl

/me ducks and runs very fast

--
Clive Eisen

Clive Eisen said:
> Obnoxio The Clown wrote:
>>
>> Bollocks. You can have bad code in any environment. I still, to this
>> day,
>> have not found a programming language as productive for solving business
>> problems as Informix-4GL.
>>
> But you stubbornly refuse to learn perl
>
> /me ducks and runs very fast

I'll take the Pepsi challenge.

--
Bye now,
Obnoxio

"... no bill is required as no value was provided."
-- Christine Normile

--
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by OpenProtect(http://www.openprotect.com), and is
believed to be clean.

Adam Williams wrote:
>>> OLEDB\ODBC\JDBC\ADO.NET
>>> 4GL
>>> ESQL\C
>> Some programming languages support Informix connectivity using
>> third-party modules that use some of the above under the hood. PHP and
>> Python have Informix modules that are implemented in ESQL/C,
>
> Yep.
>
>>> I'm interested to know what is the most common way for the application
>>> to be
>>> built.
>> The plural of "anecdote" is not "data", but here goes. I use primarily
>> Informix 4GL (and derivatives/successors), some PHP, and whenever I can,
>> I use Python. The mix is probably 95% 4GL, 3% PHP, and 2% Python.
>
> 1. Lots of PHP on intranet/extranet sites using PHP's Informix support.
> 2. Some .NET apps using ODBC connections ('native' .NET connectivity
> only available on Win32. We use these when we want either a local
> client or PHP performance just sucks too much for the task [ putting on
> flame retardant suit now to protect myself from wild-eyed unshaven PHP
> fundamentalists - probably the biggest drawback to using PHP ].

Good point! PHP was/is notoriously slow depending on how complicated
the developer can make their program. Add a lot of obfuscated code,
and it can get sluggish. Add a lot of objects, same thing. But there
is hope. High-performance sites ( external or internal ) typically install
the Zend Optimizer to increase performance, so this is less of a problem
today than it was not too long ago. You can also generate pre-compiled
code as well if you buy Zend's compiler, making a big difference in the
speed of the application. But it also depends on a good back-end
database to make it all work well. Pre-compiling does add some serious
speed though, it's highly recommended not only for speed, but also the
capability to encrypt your code into bytecode. Zend is probably the
highest price choice out there, there are others. They recently dropped
the price a lot to compete with other companies offering basically the
same thing for a lot less. ( Source Guardian for one ).


> 3. JDBC from workflow engine. Do things in workflow engines count as
> applications?
> 4. We have a bunch of old 4GL apps (Ick!!!). We occasionally have to
> modify them [fragile little bastards] but I'd never develop anything new
> in that environment.
>

Neither would I. It's a lot easier to build new apps with modern tools
that you can find people to support them. 4GL while certainly a good
tool is extremely limited compared to other options out there. But it
should be noted that without 4GL, Informix would have never made it at
all. Today, Informix will go nowhere until it teams up with a really
great application environment that developers won't have to pay an
arm-and-a-leg for, and that means typically the open source options
like PHP, Perl, Python, and others like Java and C++. But compiler
tools offer less portability. The bottom line today means offering a
tool with the database that can get developers interested in enough to
write applications for, since applications drive databases, not the
other way around.