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This presentation shows how a Powerbuilder application developed during the 1990's was updated with a modern look using Powerbuilder 12.5
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KEEPING POWERBUILDERAPPLICATIONS COMPETITIVE
Buck Woolley, Patrix AB, Powerbuilder DeveloperJohn Strano, Sybase, an SAP Company, Technology Evangelist
May 17, 2012
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
INTRODUCTIONBuck Woolley, Powerbuilder Consultant at Patrix AB, 2004 - Present
He has been actively developing software for a variety of clients and industries using Powerbuilder since version 3.1. He is the author of several articles on advanced Powerbuilder datawindow development in both PBDJ and ISUG journals. He has delivered presentations on the same subject at several Techwave conferences and won the 2007 ISUG journal award for the article ‘Utilizing the Power of the Datawindow Object’.Some of his work can be seen on the website www.dw-extreme.com.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
AGENDA
• What is the product?• What is the market?• What were the goals?• Design considerations.• Look at several specific changes to the
application.• Detail some Powerbuilder techniques used in
the update.• Look at addition examples of user interface
upgrades.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
PRODUCT - PATRICIA• Intellectual Property... inventions (patents),
trademarks, industrial designs and copyrights.• “Patricia is an enterprise wide solution that
provides point-and-click access to case data and automatic tracking of relevant IP, i.e., laws/regulations, standard forms, time and cost registration, invoicing, document management including mail merge activities and batch processing. “
• Monthly maintenance releases, yearly major release.
• Main application Patricia and a separate maintenance system for setup.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
PRODUCT - PATRICIA• First Windows release started development in
1995. The application contained the look and feel that was popular at the time.
• Originally developed for resolution of 800 x 600 SVGA
• Change in the mid 2000’s for 1024 x 768 XGA
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
MARKET• Clients located worldwide. • IP departments of corporations across all
industries, IP departments of law firms and specialized patent bureaus.
• Single person offices to largest corporate entities.
• One - several hundred users.• For each installation the requirements are quite
varied. Complex conversion processes.• Support SQL Server, Oracle, Sybase.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
IP TRIVIA....What was the first trademark ever registered and when?
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
IP TRIVIA....What was the first trademark ever registered and when?
1876 – The Bass Brewery’s Red Triangle for ale was the first trademark to be registered under the Trade Mark Registration Act 1875 in England
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
GOALS• To modernized the user interface of the
application for competitive reasons by taking advantage of new features in Powerbuilder.
• Improve and unify window presentation• Provide for more user customization of windows
and lists• Have applications fully localized, allow for the
creation of custom languages.• Allow users to switch from old to new GUI at
runtime to facilitate the change.• Better organization of querying and reporting,
clean up menus.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS• Complete makeover, not just an upgrade of the
existing UI.• Keep all existing functionality, use as much
existing code as possible.• Provide a more consistent experience throughout
the application• Provide full customization of security,
functionality, presentation to the user/group level.
• Had to implement the new UI while doing routine enhancements, wishes and bug fixes.
• Must integrate with existing windows, new UI phased in over time.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS• Have a bit more of a ‘browser’ look. Present
data as a document by showing all data for a section in one scrollable form, only displaying data. Make better use of varied screen resolutions.
• Use a design template that would be familiar to most Windows users.... Outlook. Modified with input from in house users and group of client representatives.
• Use Powerbuilder classic, deliver standard Win32 application.
• Implement the project into three phases, each scheduled for one year.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
EXISTING APPLICATION
The main window, traditional Windows MDI application that has been expanded and added to over time.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
EXISTING APPLICATION
Tabs
Traditional Windows MDI application that has been expanded and added to over time.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
EXISTING APPLICATION
Command Buttons
Traditional Windows MDI application that has been expanded and added to over time.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
EXISTING APPLICATION
Various Input, Summary and Image Display areas crowded
together
Traditional Windows MDI application that has been expanded and added to over time.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
EXISTING APPLICATION
Traditional Windows MDI application that has been expanded and added to over time.
Mystery Icons and unmarked hotspots
?????
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
UPDATED APPLICATION
Same window in new UI with functional areas clearly defined.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
UPDATED APPLICATION
Header Information
New window with functional areas clearly defined.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
UPDATED APPLICATION
Window Functional Areas
New window with functional areas clearly defined.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
UPDATED APPLICATION
Functional Area Specific Actions
New window with functional areas clearly defined.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
UPDATED APPLICATION
Work Area
New window with functional areas clearly defined.
Basic Case Data
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
CONSISTENT USER EXPERIENCE
Contact Management
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
CONSISTENT USER EXPERIENCE
Financial Data
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
CONSISTENT USER EXPERIENCE
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
USE MODAL WINDOWS FOR EDIT
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
SETTING FUNCTION ACCESS TO USER GROUPS
This user has access to all the functional areas
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
SETTING FUNCTION ACCESS TO USER GROUPS
This user has limited access to functionality
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
PRESENT DATA AS DOCUMENT
Only Items with data are displayed in a collapsable, scrollable ‘document’
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
PRESENT DATA AS DOCUMENT
Small amount of data displayed
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
USER DEFINED LISTS
Columns in all lists can be selected, moved and resized by the user.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
TRANSLATED AT RUNTIME
Translated by user and groups. Clients can create their own language for custom labels.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
TRANSLATED AT RUNTIME
Localization by user and groups. Clients can create their own language for custom labels.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
IMPROVED REPORT REQUESTING
Report requests were scattered on the MDI menu
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
IMPROVED REPORT REQUESTING
Reports are now consolidated on a report request window. Access can be controlled per user group.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
IMPROVED REPORT REQUESTING
Specific report lists for each section can be opened by the user.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
IMPROVED REPORT CREATION
List creation and formatting together in one step.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
IMPROVED REPORT CREATION
Users are presented with all possible columns to choose and arrange in a list.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
IMPROVED REPORT CREATION
Users can then format the list into separate report using the Flex Report component from Felix.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
NEW POWERBUILDER FEATURES – BACKGROUND SHADINGBackground shading effects, introduced in Powerbuilder 11.5, are used extensively to give the application a modern appearance.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
NEW POWERBUILDER FEATURES - TREEVIEW DATAWINDOWThe treeview datawindow, introduced in Powerbuilder 10.5, is used in many windows. An nvo was created to turn any list into a user configurable treeview enabled grid datawindow.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
TRANSLATION PROCESS
• 1. Retrieve all translations at startup for the users language.
• 2. As a window is opened, extract and store all text strings and objects associated with the window and all included user objects and datawindows.
• 3. During the open event, translate all strings matching string text and the text objects owner if necessary.
• 4. Apply translations back to the text parameters of stored objects. If no translation is found then use the existing text.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
TRANSLATION PROCESS
At application start up, retrieve all strings for the users language into a globally defined dropdown datawindow containing the base(english) data string and the translated(french) display string.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
TRANSLATION PROCESSThe extracted labels are added to an array containing the translation in a dropdown datawindow. The translated values are extracted using a computed field containing the lookupdisplay() function.
graphicobject[40] = cb_close
string[40] = ‘Close’
graphicobject[40].text = trans_value[40]
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
SUMMARY
• Created a complete makeover of the UI. Patricia now has a modern competitive user interface.
• From a sales perspective: ‘...being a big change to look and feel, there was a little reluctance from old Patricia users to change but within 30 minutes of doing so they all realised the many benefits of the new GUI. New users take to it immediately as it is very logical and user-friendly....’
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
ADDITIONAL EXAMPLES
• Apply the new datawindow objects visual properties introduced in Powerbuilder 11.5 to advanced dynamic datawindows to create modern user interfaces.
• Specifically used the object background and transparency properties.
• Example - Planner datawindow
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
EXISTING PLANNER WINDOW
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
NEW SCHEDULER WINDOW
Applied a new color scheme and implemented the background gradients and object transparency from Powerbuilder 11.5.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
NEW PLANNER WINDOW
New features from PB 11.5 such as background effects and transparency create a modern look.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
NEW PLANNER WINDOW
PB applications can be modern. Camtasia and PB.
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
THE FUTURE???
Moving to devices with Appeon Mobile
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
THE FUTURE???
Moving to devices with Appeon Mobile
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
RESOURCES• Datawindow techniques slide presentation from
2006 Sybase Techwave. http://www.slideshare.net/bwoolley3/techwave-2006-advanced-datawindow-techniques
• PBDJ The Powerbuilder Datawindow as an Image Thumbnail Display Control, Jan 2012
• PBDJ Datawindow Consolidation, In Print• PBDJ List Management Using the Datawindow,
Coming Soon• Patrix website www.patrix.com• Flex Report Control
http://www.felix.fr/produits/flxReport/flxReport.cfm
– Company Confidential – March 31, 2012
CONTACT
• Email: [email protected]• Skype: bwoolley• LinkedIn: Buck Woolley• Location: San Diego, CA• Website www.dw-extreme.com• New website under construction on
www.behance.net/dw-extreme
