Source Code Control for PowerBuilder Classic & .Net

[Former Member]

We are looking at moving from the PB Native Source Control System in PowerBuilder 12 Classic to a third-party SCC system.  Since we plan to move to PowerBuilder 12.5 .Net next year, we want a solution that will work well for both development environments.  If you are using a third-party SCC system, which one are you using and would you recommend it?  Thanks in advance for your feedback!

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Bill;

  FYI: Many of my Canadian Federal Government clients are switching over to the open source SCM called Tortiose - which is a free version of SubVersion. You can download it from here: http://tortoisesvn.net.

For the PB Client side, you can use the Tortoise client for PB - which works with Classic or .Net. You can download the client from here: http://code.google.com/p/pbscc-proxy

FYI ... Tips:  http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/90099/Using-SVN-as-source-control-for-Sybase-PowerBuilde

HTH

Regards ... Chris

[former_member190719 · Accepted solution]

"the open source SCM called Tortiose - which is a free version of SubVersion"

     Tortiose is not an SCM.  It's a windows shell that allows you to talk to Subversion.

     Subversion itself is open source.

"Tortoise client for PB - which works with Classic or .Net. You can download the client from here: http://code.google.com/p/pbscc-proxy""

     That's the PushOK proxy, not Tortoise.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Bruce;

  No, PushOK is a different client and it has a license fee. PB SCC is another client and works great with Tortoise plus, its free.

FYI:  http://bigsnowball.com/book/export/html/28

Regards ... Chris

[former_member190719 · Accepted solution]

My bad, misread the url.

But you understand that TortoiseSVN is not a free version of Subversion, it's a shell that talks to Subversion, correct?  That CodeProject site you referenced notes that:

• Use SVN as source control (you can use both *nix or Windows platform).
• Use TortoiseSVN (or any other free SVN GUI clients) for access to sources.

FWIW, some variations on those tips:

• Use Winmerge or any other free utility for sources differences comparison.

I recommend SourceGear's Diffmerge.  It does a particular good job of highlight changes within lines, which comes in real handy when trying to find subtle differences in datawindow syntax.

http://www.sourcegear.com/diffmerge/

• Export all sources into SVN project source tree (the best way is to export every PBL library into the separate directory in the SVN source tree).

The article seems to assume that you would export everything to source and then control the source files directly.  I would not recommend that.  That's what the PushOK or PB SCC proxies and PowerBuilder's built in source control interfaces manages for you.

• On building machine, use PowerGen for project compilation and PBLs restore. In each build, you can take your PBLs from scratch (PowerGen can resolve all dependencies between objects and import them back into PBLs in the correct order).

Agree completely.

http://www.ecrane.com/powergen1.cfm

• Every developer takes fresh PBLs after every build.

We use an OracScript script that does a update and target rebuilt that developer's normally have scheduled to run every morning before they get to work.  They can still do periodic updates throughout the day, but the daily job saves them a lot of time waiting for the sync.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Bruce;

  Correct ... TortoiseSVN + SVN work together. Both are free and the new Tortoise has quite a nice GUI BTW to wrapper SVN.

  I agree - WinMerge + WinDiff are great add-on's to complete the SCM package. Thanks for the tip on DiffMerge!  🙂

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member]

SVN with TortoiseSVN or is ankhsvn: Subversion Support for Visual Studio a good choice.

[Former Member]

Hi Chris, thanks for such a quick response.

I'm also starting to test the WizSource. Seems quite simple and uses my current DB to store things, quite cool. Seems I'll have to buy a user licence to test concurrency though.

And yes, I'll check the QVCS also. Thanks a lot.

Daniel

[Former Member]

BTW: A few consulting friends of mine are using Perforce (which Dale mentioned earlier) - which is also working very well for them.

Good luck!

[Former Member]

i tried QVCS awhile back - it was way too slow, especially if you do anything remote via VPN.  We use Wizsource.

[Former Member]

Hi guys,

I have been using TFS for some time, but know I'd like to experience with other sources, less expensive ones. I'm not sure if this thread is open, but it was the best one I could find, sorry for not creating a new one.

I installed the VisualSVN and was able to connect over the LAN on the server. One thing was I was very disappointed was that the VisualSVN server doesn't even show what PB files are checked out to who. Am I missing something? (for the client/PB side I tried both AgentSVN and PushOK).

I also tried Tortoise with PBSCC, but it only seems to work locally. Tortoise shows what files are checked out to whom, but I didn't try it in depth because I couldn't get it to connect remotely.

Should I try other options?

Thanks for your time and advice.

Daniel

[Former Member]

FYI:  QVCS "Enterprise" is now fully open source.

jimv39/qvcsos · GitHub

[Former Member]

> I installed the VisualSVN and was able to connect over the LAN on the server. One thing was I was very disappointed was that the VisualSVN server doesn't even show what PB files are checked out to who. Am I missing something?

I think you should be able to see that information by using the repo browser that comes with TortoiseSVN.

> (for the client/PB side I tried both AgentSVN and PushOK).

As the author of AgentSVN I'm curious, did you run into any issues?

AgentSVN works fine with both the VisualSVN and the standard SVN server. I also know it works with PB as most of the latest changes have come at the request of active PB users.

Cheers Jussi

[Former Member]

Hi Bill;

  Here is an update on your initial question -  FWIW .. try QVCS - it works great with PB and now all its versions are free!   

FYI:  http://www.qumasoft.com/index1.html

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member]

Since you reopened this thread, I'll mention that I have WizSource working with MySQL and it works well over the Internet. I'll be releasing a new version with MySQL option in a few days.

[Former Member]

I'm not sure why this thread has come alive again; it looks pretty old.

The above said, we've been using Perforce at one of my clients, and while there seems to be a pretty glaring incompatibility for PowerBuilder 11.2 and older, PowerBuilder 11.5, 12.0, and 12.5 all work very well.

[Former Member]

We are very satisfied with PowerVCS. The product gives us no issues and the guys respond to the emails very quickly (very friendly chaps)

[Former Member]

I am looking for information regarding SVN and PowerBuilder - trying to set up a current project under SVN control. There are several articles on how to set up PB and SVN.  Each of the articles talk about creating a local working directory first and then "checking out" from the repository which seems to tie these two together.  After that, I went into PB and set up my Source Control section on the work space to use that working directory / project.  That all works fine.  I then add all my objects to the source control, which too works fine.  It updates the repository and working directory with all the objects.  I am able to check out and check in objects which is reflected in the Work Directory only.  I can see the check mark on the object in PB and the lock symbol on the object in the local working directory.  I do not see anything reflected in the repository itself.  Once I make changes to that object and check it back in, the changes are reflected in PB and the Working directory only.  My question is how do these changes get promoted to the repository?  Is another step required outside of PB for that to happen? We are using PB 11.5.  Thanks for the help!

[Former Member]

WizSource has a customer using it on Oracle for the past two months without any issues.

[Former Member]

I recommend WizSource found at http://www.topwizprogramming.com/wizsource.html

It is low cost with many high end features.

[Former Member]

The Agent SVN is a MS-SCCI plug-in for Subversion and it works with PowerBuilder.

Here is a tutorial explaining how to setup the plug-in: http://zeusedit.com/agent/pb/classic.html

The tutorial above is for the PowerBuilder Classic but the plug-in should also work fine with the PowerBuilder .Net version.

Jussi Jumppanen

Author: Agent SVN

[Former Member]

Just some thoughts based on recent experience:

1. I'd echo what Chris and Mike have said about Roland's WizSource. It's fast, efficient, well-integrated with PowerBuilder, and it works well with remote clients connected via the Internet. Pricing is very reasonable.

2. If your project requires branching and/or you develop with so-called "Agile" methods, I'd take a close look at Plastic SCM. Setup can be a challenge if you have distributed teams (buggy admin tools), but once everything's working, it's got some pretty cool branching and merging capabilities, it lets you easily "time warp" your entire workspace to any prior check-in or merge point, and works well with distributed teams who may be occasionally off line. Pricing is also reasonable (free for up to 15 developers).

[Former Member]

The latest Beta build of WizSource has support for Oracle. I have tested with Express 11g on Windows XP.

[Former Member]

We've used MS Visual Source Safe with PB for years. It has worked very well for us. We use MS Team Foundation Server for C#.

[Former Member]

Hi Mark;

  VSS is no longer supported by MS and was EOL'ed a few years ago.

regards ... Chris

[Former Member]

I use Plastic SCM with PB 12.1 Classic.  Works well.

Haven't tried with PB.Net yet.

[Former Member]

Thanks for all the feedback!  Looks like I have a little work to do now.

[Former Member]

Regardless of the system, make sure you 'structure' your application libraries properly for souce control use.  By this I mean making sure each pbl is contained within it's own folder in the filesystem.  This means instead of:

c:\mypb\app.pbl

c:\mypb\window.pbl

c:\mypb\object.pbl

you use

c:\mypb\app\app.pbl

c:\mypb\window\window.pbl

c:\mypb\object\object.pbl

[former_member190719]

FYI, something I don't use personally, but I did recommend to somebody at the PowerBuilder Developer's Conference last week based on their needs is PowerVCS.

http://www.powervcs.com/

They were looking for something they could use with PowerBuilder that would support developers working from multiple locations.  PowerVCS is a hosted solution from ECrane that is tailored to work with PowerBuilder.

[Former Member]

"support developers working from multiple locations"

Roland's wizsource SCC is a great option for this.  You have two options - simply use a VPN (since it is client/server and the source is compressed it is very fast) to connect to the SCC database.  The other option is to host it on an IIS website.  So, you can host it on your internal website, or outsource it to rackspace, amazon etc.  It was this capability that sold me on wizsource.  Well, that and the fact that it is a PB guy who wrote it - i know it will work with PB. 

i just use the VPN option currently. 

I use PBdelta (now prodiff) for change comparison.  I wanted something that worked really well with powerbuilder.

I prefer to pay something to ensure that the product will be continued.

[Former Member]

Also, wizsource does not list oracle as a supported database.  I think that is because roland didn't have anyone using his SCC and oracle.  In his earlier versions it was supported (i know since i provided him with some of the oracle DDL ), so if you are an oracle shop you might want to see if he would be willing to support oracle again.

[Former Member]

The only SQL in WizSource I would have to change for Oracle is to use the SYSDATE function instead of GETDATE() that is used in Microsoft/Sybase databases.

No one has ever asked me about using it with Oracle. If someone wanted to use it on Oracle I would be willing to look into it.

At work we have been using WizSource with MS Visual Studio 2005 for our ASP Classic web application and it works well. I have done a small amount of testing in PB.Net and didn't see any issues.

[Former Member]

Roland,

you might also consider putting your getdate() function in schema like this

  create or replace function getdate return date

  is

  begin

       return sysdate;

  end;

[Former Member]

Krzysztof,

I had been doing it that way for Oracle. I ran into problems trying to do the same on MySQL so now I have a function in PB code that has a case statement that runs the appropriate statement based on which type of database it is connected to.

Thanks,

Roland

[Former Member]

Hey Bill,

It was great meeting you at the conference.

I use Roland Smith's SCC.

http://www.topwizprogramming.com/wizsource.html

I still use just classic, but he has it working with .net too.

It is fast and uses a dbms to store the files (sql anywhere, sql server, ...) 

-mike

[Former Member]

Hi Mike;

  I have used Roland's SCM solution as well and its a great cost effective solution!

Roland: Its amazing what a little Mountain Dew can do!  🙂

Regards ... Chris

[former_member190719]

Subversion using the PushOK proxy for the IDEs (http://www.pushok.com/software/svn.html) and TortoiseSVN for non IDE files (http://tortoisesvn.net/).  We use VisualSVN for the server so that we don't have do to command line administration (http://www.visualsvn.com/).

[Former Member]

Hi Bruce;

  VisualSVN is very good but does require license fees.

Regards ... Chris

[former_member190719]

VisualSVN:  The "standard" edition of the server component is free:

http://www.visualsvn.com/server/licensing/

That's all we use, we don't use their client, we use PushOK and TortoiseSVN for that.

We actually use the "professional" server version so that we can do remote server administration, so we paid the license fee for that.  Thought it was worth the rather small licensing cost rather than having to remote into the server.

Some things are worth paying for.  Something isn't always better just because it's "free".

[Former Member]

Hi Bruce;

=> Some things are worth paying for.

  I agree 100% in this case as I have used PushOK + VisualSVN and their a great duo.  Your right, the small cost is well worth the monies for the extra functionality you get!   🙂

I guess Bill has a lot to ponder now given the great suggestions in this thread.

Regards ...Chris

[Former Member]

Hi Bill,

My company has evaluated a few third party SCC systems for PB in the past.  None really fully met our needs.  I know some teams have had success using PushOK as the PB plug-in connected to  Subversion (like Chris mentions).  Others mentioned TeamFoundation from MS.

We have looked at tools like PlasticSCM but never found the time to give it the attention it needed.  It looked nice though.  There is a LinkedIn discussion around SCC if you want to view the comments - HERE

Please post back to the group and let us know what you learn (and choose).

Matt