PB Forms and 9

[Michael Mayerhoffer]

I noticed in the help > Improved interaction with PowerBASIC Forms

My question, PB Forms 1.5 need an update to work with PB 9 ? or is just fine as it is.

[Richard Angell]

AFAIK it does not, the changes made allow a logical, interactive switching between PBWin and PBForms. However, 1.5 does not generate the latest CONTROL ADD statements for controls such as LISTVIEW, TREEVIEW, TAB, STATUS BAR, PROGRESS BAR, TOOL BAR, etc. These continue as before, in the custom control add format. So for interactive use, you will not want to change the PBForms produced code to these new DDT statements, but for those who do not use PBForms, the new CONTROL ADD STATEMENTS will make your code more instantly readable ... in light of the significant additional statements and functions added in 9.0

Now what I really want to see sooner than too much later is
PB FORMS 2.0lease:, Bob?

Yes, I know that for the moment though PBWin 9 and PBCC 5 definitely will take center stage and folks will need some time to absorb the immensity of these new versions!

[John Petty]

Richard I agree that it appears that PBForms will not support the new commands in Dialog creation, but many of the new commands are mainly for use outside the creation stage like determining multiple selections in list/combo boxes and the new graphics commands will make new code easier to read and simpler.
Need more time to read the new manual in detail but on first looks these are enough to warrant the upgrade purchase. (Still not an OOPs fan)
John

[Richard Angell]

Yes that is right on

It's not for lack of raising the point in beta though. I'd like to have seen a PB-FORMS 1.5x at least ... that did use the new CONTROL ADD statements. The reason being to have the much more BASIC like readable code in the source for those operations. However I believe you will appreciate the tremendous amount of effort that Bob and PB staff put into the flagship products for this release.

[Chris Holbrook]

...folks will need some time to absorb the immensity of these new versions!

...and other folks will ignore the immensity and just expect them to work! I happen to know that some of the latter kind of folks also use PB Forms.

[Richard Angell]

Ah ... but immensity refers mainly to learning the many newly optimized ways of doing things with native PB statements and DDT wraps. It's normal to expect them to work. Probably all expect Power BASIC to work out of the box ... and most really appreciate how PB always has moved rapidly to fix any nit or bug not uncovered during beta, so all can rely on the language and compiler day in and day out.

[Bud Durland]

I rarely use the PB IDE anymore. If it's not a FireFly project, I use PB/Forms and JellyFish. Until PBForms supports PB 9.x, I probably won't upgrade.

[Cliff Nichols]

Just out of stupidity on my part....

I noticed the announcements for the new versions, but did not notice PB-Forms...

So is there one to come to fix? or is it just the idea that the upgrade does not affect PB Forms???

(I already told my boss I need the new version, but I forgot to research if I need a PbForms with it so I keep all versions on the same level?)

[Richard Angell]

There is no new version of PB-Forms announced with the release of PBWin 9. All the improvements for interaction with PBForms are in the PBWin IDE side for improved task switching between the two products.

PB 9 has a lot more to offer than meets the initial new feature scan. Even the IDE has new features. Consider for example compiling from the PB-IDE no longer dumps the undo buffer, so you can regress quickly to previous source by undo of edits in last to first order. Also you can save a group of files as a re-loadable project ... the initial beginning of project management out of the box ... maybe. However some 3rd party products are more directed at SDK coding or VB IDE styles, and may have more bells and whistles.

So although some folks love different IDE's, it's the compiler that really is the target for most of us to acquire. On that point, Firefly should be able to handle 9.0 improvements as well. After all only a portion of the new and improved features are for DDT use, while most of the rest are useful for SDK coding as well.

[Michael Mayerhoffer]

I certainly did not mean to open a can of worms it was more of a backwards compatible question.

I ordered 9 with in an hour of the notice, I certainly would not let PB Forms be an issue, it still works, just does not have built in support for generating code for the new controls.

I find myself preferring PB Forms over the 3rd party solutions, so I do hope they release something newer and have support for them pesky OCX.

The com support is the big issue, I can stop using VC++ and use one compiler and one designer. Not to mention I have confidence in the product and won't spend hours trying to figure a work around for some bug M$ has ignored for umpteen versions.