Application Development Tools Update

by Bob Deskin, Senior Product Manager, Application Development Tools, Cognos Inc.

It has been a few months since the last Application Development Tools (ADT) update so I wanted to share the latest news and provide some information on the upcoming release. Check out the latest Application Development Tools Roadmap at http://powerhouse.cognos.com.

Maintenance Release Update

As I write this, the PowerHouse 4GL and PowerHouse Web 8.4xE and the Axiant 4GL 3.4E release is undergoing final install testing. This release includes enhancements, bug fixes, and conformance changes. It will be shipped to all supported customers by September 2007 and available for download from the Cognos Support web site (http://support.cognos.com) in June.

The following is a summary of supported environments and enhancement highlights:

8.49E – MPE/iX

• MPE/iX 6.5 Express 2, 7.0, 7.5
• IMAGE, KSAM, KSAM XL, KSAM 64
• ALLBASE/SQL

8.40E – OpenVMS – Alpha

• OpenVMS 7.3-2, 8.2, and 8.3
• RMS & RMS ISAM
• Oracle 9i (9.2.0) and 10g (10.1.0 and 10.2.0) (10g on OpenVMS 8.2 and 8.3 only)
• Oracle Rdb 7.1 and 7.2 (7.2 on OpenVMS 8.2 and 8.3 only)

8.40E – OpenVMS – Itanium

• OpenVMS 8.2-1 and 8.3
• RMS & RMS ISAM
• Oracle 10g (10.2.0)
• Oracle Rdb 7.2

8.43E – UNIX – HP-UX (PA-RISC and Itanium), AIX, Solaris

• HP-UX 11i V1 and 11i V2, AIX 5L 5.2 and 5.3, Solaris 8 (2.8), 9 (2.9), and 10
• UNIXIO
• C-ISAM 7.25
• Eloquence B.07.00 and B.07.10 (on HP-UX)
• Omnidex 3.8.0 (on HP-UX)
• Oracle 9i (9.2.0) and 10g (10.1.0 and 10.2.0)
• Sybase ASE 12.5 (12.5.0) and 15.0 (15.0)
• DB2 8.2 and 9 (via 8.2 client)
• DataDirect 5.1 to SQL Server 2000 and 5.2 ODBC to SQL Server 2000 and 2005

8.41E/3.4E – Windows – Intel X86 32 bit and 64 bit

• Windows 2000 SP4, XP Pro SP2, Server 2003 Release 2, Server 2003 Release 2 x64
• DISAM96
• Eloquence B.07.00 and B.07.10
• Oracle 9i (9.2.0) and 10g (10.1.0 and 10.2.0)
• Sybase ASE 12.5 (12.5.0) and 15.0 (15.0)
• DB2 8.2 and 9 (via 8.2 client)
• SQL Server 2000 and 2005 (via ODBC)
• SQL Anywhere 9.0 (via ODBC)

Relational Support

Along with new relational database versions, there is support for Oracle external procedures (user defined functions). A new ITEM statement option in QDESIGN and QTP – OMIT –allows you to specify that a column is read-only and should be omitted from the update and any checksums. This is useful when the database does not return read-only column information to the PowerHouse data access routines.

There are also a number of new program parameters including one called bulkfetch. Bulkfetch lets you specify how many rows are retrieved by each fetch. By default the number of rows retrieved is very low to minimize memory usage. By testing various values for the bulkfetch program parameter, you can determine the optimal value for your particular database and system, as well as for your particular screen, run, or report.

Windows Features

One of the priorities for this release was to fill in the feature set for PowerHouse 4GL for Windows to ensure that it was consistent with the other platforms. The intent is to make Windows an equally attractive migration target to UNIX.

QKView, the shell client for QUICK, has already been discussed in previous update articles. Function keys are available in QUICK for Windows in 8.41E. Since the function keys can have labels displayed in both the Command Prompt window and in QKView, you can use dynamic function keys. As well, the QKGO system now includes tic file creation and dynamic function keys.

Additional PowerHouse 4GL Enhancements

Among the other enhancements are the PHTEMPKEEP environment variable on UNIX and Windows. If it is set along with the PHTEMP environment variable, temporary subfiles are not deleted at the end of the QUIZ or QTP session. This means that batch compiles can now be done in much the same way as on MPE/iX and OpenVMS.

The QUIZ report size limit has been increased from 264 to 32,767. LOGONID is now a valid application security class ID method on UNIX. Reverse reads are available in RMS ISAM on OpenVMS. And there's a new ETOP utility on UNIX and Windows that lets you generate PDL dictionary source code from an Eloquence database.

Selected PowerHouse Web Features

A new Dispatcher type – the two-way routing Dispatcher – has been added for security reasons. This Dispatcher type allows you to track the ports going in and out of the firewall as opposed to the PHCGI that picks up any available port. The Dispatcher Server Process Timeout has been modified to allow a start time as well as an interval. This makes it easy to have the Dispatcher restart at a specific time of day.

Field error messages can now have the field label appended to the message. Fields in error can be highlighted or identified using text before and/or after the field. For example, a field in error could be highlighted using asterisks. As well, PowerHouse Web can now display multiple field error messages as opposed to one at a time.

The new WEBEXIT procedure allows developers to add processing that is performed just prior to the results page being formatted. A new program parameter indicates whether a pending DEFER LINKPAGE should be executed if there is an error on the page. Also, the RESET LINKPAGE verb lets you procedurally discard any pending DEFER LINKPAGE.

The Next Release

Even as we put the finishing touches on the E release, we are starting work on the next release, tentatively labeled 8.4xF/3.4F. Stay tuned for information on this in the next ADT update.