Hi SWES

Dev Studio will be functionally stabilized in WebFOCUS 8200. Will have to eventually make the leap and that is where I was coming from. I do understand the migration process, the cost of learning App Studio, and being productive but I do think that the advantage of going to App Studio will be worth it in the long run. In the short term you may very well pull your hair out and look like me. Been there done that.

Thanks Barry

I am not speaking for the others in the thread, but I'm terrified of opening a Dev Studio v7.7.05 HTML Composer created page in App Studio 8x. We have dozens of pages, most may require modifications over the years. The strategy Information Builders seems to suggest is to recreate every page that needs updating.

Over the years I've struggled just to add one additional parameter to a page, now we face the possibility of rebuilding a mountain of pages. Not very productive.

quote:

Originally posted by Francis Mariani:
Yup. I think I need one soon.

Francis, thanks for introducing us Yankss to "a dog's breakfast" - classic!

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=dog%27s+breakfast

As we are on our long odyssey to move from 7.7 to 8.1, I can tell you that our composer items have required the most work. Among other things, we had to open in the newer version of Dev Studio and rebind things, save, then open in WF8 App Studio (maybe rebind)and save. Still they are working (barely) under BID which exists but has been superseded by BIP. Thus an upgrade follow-on project will rewrite all of these for WF8 BIP.

I'm still on ver 7.x, but clients may be moving to 8.x soon.

In ver 8.x, can I still design my HTML outside the box, and save them in the file system like 7.x? If that works I won't have any complains.

I've given up on the app studio and went back to Dev Studio. I use the UI builder for placement only and then rip out everything IBI puts in it, to generate my own -HTMLFORMs with my own loops or variables. I find I can do my development in half the time. Got tired of searching through a billion options, to find the one that I already know what is. I now have full control over the UI with no limitations outside of HTML5 itself. I use WebFOCUS for what it's best at, the connectors, portal security, and simple graphs. Anything complex goes strait into -HTMLFORM. Made my life a billion times easier.

Edit: Also got me out of a lot of bugs that were uncovered.

Found another thing the GUI doesn't allow you to do:

1. Place an image file within an app directory on the Data Servers side;
2. Create a new HTML Composer page;
3. Insert the image you placed under Data Servers into the page;

** Tool then automatically creates a copy of the image in the folder that your newly created HTML page lives in and references that image file instead. **

4. Go to the image's properties panel to try and set the reference back to the one you put in an app folder under Data Servers (because you don't want image files in the folder you created your HTML doc in);

** Tool acts as if you never made the change. This is the case whether you manually type it in, or click the "..." button on the far right and use the dialog box selection tool. Even if you try to save it after changing it, it doesn't take. **

WHY?! This hasn't been the 1st element property that didn't work as expected. Argh...

Perhaps (a tiny perhaps) you can type the full path of the image instead of pointing and clicking. This was the correct suggestion for adding JS and CSS files without them being copied into the Content folder of the HTML page.

quote:

Originally posted by CoolGuy:
** Tool acts as if you never made the change. This is the case WHETHER YOU MANUALLY TYPE IT IN, or click the "..." button on the far right and use the dialog box selection tool. Even if you try to save it after changing it, it doesn't take. **

Francis,

In my previous post, I stated that I did such. Still doesn't work. Where are you referencing that I type it out if other than in the properties input field for such?

I used IBFS:/EDA/EDASERVE/images/myImage.gif for the full path. Reverts right back to the Content address.

Sorry. I didn't completely read your post.

I would like to open a case to just ask WHY it is designed this way.

No worries man. Just wanted to clarify. I'm about to open one myself.

i just finished a migration and did all the launch pages BY HAND!!! over 200 of them.
i copied a simple structure of a basic page, and then text-edited EVERYTHING else.
and they work, and they're pretty!
I opened the home page of the new devstu and said 'youve gotta be kidding me' and closed it. never opened it again.

Confirmed that it still does this on 8.1.05 (literally just finished upgrading).

Any obvious fixes/improvements in 8.1.05 ?

Francis,

Just submitted a case (#22783574).

Waz,

In 8.1.05, you are able to finally set up a drill link to navigate to a specified page within your portal, refreshing one or more panels with the provided params.

Also, they added the buttons to preview your HTML pages, reports, graphs, etc. in either Chrome, IE, or Firefox under Utilities so you don't have to go into your AppStudio Options and reset the default output viewer settings every time you want to test something in more than one browser. This is nice, but is almost meaningless due to the fact that you no longer can edit the HTML code yourself in AppStudio. Try to use an external editor (like was advised by David Glick from IBI) and you most likely will lose everything in the process (happened to me using Notepad++).

Other than those items, I can't recall seeing anything else new-wise that is of note. There was at least one bug fix I took part in getting them to add for the Selection & Validation property for input controls. Previous to 8.1.05, it does not work. There are probably other things that were fixed and added, but those are the things that effect our site that were of note for us.

FYI in 8.1.04, you can edit HTML pages in the internal text editor with this technique.

Thanks to my co-worker here that accidentally stumbled across this.

Note: this only seems to work with a fex below the html file.

select the html file, select the fex below it, right-click and find Open in Text Editor

Waz!! Thank you for the hack! Sweet!! Now quick!...Delete your post before IBI finds it and submits a block to be implemented for it! haha