Powerbuilder - is it just dead to sap?

[Former Member]

With no news from sap regarding powerbuilder we ask it it just dead to sap?

[former_member190719 · Accepted solution]

They haven't made a final decision about what to do with it yet.  See this blog post. 

If you'd like to let SAP know that you're concerned about SAP's decision, I might suggest you look at a couple of petitions:

The first petition simply encourages SAP to get moving with the release of the next version.  The second one goes a bit further, suggesting that SAP should release it to a third party or open source it if they aren't going to actively develop it.  Some people weren't comfortable with the suggestions in the second petition and were more comfortable with the first.  You might sign one of them, whichever you feel most comfortable with.

We're trying to get as many signatures as possible by the start of SAP TechEd in Las Vegas (October 21st) so that they can be presented to SAP senior management during the conference.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

When a guy you've grown up with leaves the city, it's a pain.

If he doesn't call you for a while, what will you think?

You might fetch your cellphone and make the call.

But deep inside you know you probably already lost him as a friend.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Very Well Said.

Yes, Bruce & Chris and the Rest are trying but it seems one way. Year is about to end and there is nothing.

I wish sap at least provides us a way to migrate away from powerbuilder to .net. They had developed pb.net over many years and it would definitely help if they open sourced it so everyone can be happy about their investments in powerbuilder.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

I would feel positive if the employees/developers/engineers/evangelists assigned to PB prior to the merger were still actively working on and promoting it. From what I can find they aren't. Those actions alone speak volumes to me.

At this point I'm merely hopeful something good is happening to the product, and that's starting to feel a little foolish.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi;

  Actually, PB.net is one thing that Sybase did that actually accelerated the decline of PB and the fragmentation of the PB Community.

WHY ...

1) Most PB developers use and still plan to use PB Classic (aka NATIVE). In fact its 90% plus for PB Classic!

-  http://www.visual-expert.com/EN/survey-pb-stored-procedure-sybase-mssql

- http://www.linkedin.com/groupItem?view=&gid=103059&type=member&item=119307050&qid=a3fd16e3-224e-4809...

2) With Appeon you can deploy from PB classic to J2EE or .NET simultaneously & transparently!

3) PB.Net is not ready for prime time and has a lot of work to do on it to make it so.

4) Cloud computing has actually contributed to the decline use of .Net (and also Mr Balmer <bg> and resurgence of J2EE (now 52+% world wide in 2013).

5) PB.Net does not support web or mobile.

  - primary direction for most IT shops

etc

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

What do you recommend owner of a Commercial client-server Application written in PowerBuilder with over 15,000 users should do given the situation?

Rewriting is expensive and takes lot of time and resources.

Appeon is not a solution since we use other apps also written in .net

Wish list is that we want to be in the cloud, work natively on ipad

BTW, is John Strano still employed and what is he doing now?

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Suppose you have a commercial project written in Powerbuilder.

For historical reasons, most probably:

    1. It's closed source (PBL/PBD)

    2. It has a Client-Server architecture (DB server)

    3. It's large and stable

    4. It's not PB.NET

You want to rewrite it First, ask yourself if it's worth.

You can just write new things in a new language.

If you have to migrate, rewriting everything is a big risk.

It requires lots of time and money.

You could simply rewrite some part and let the two systems coexist.

There is a big difference between the two:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copy_and_paste_programming

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modular_programming

These would be good candidates for modularization:

    Authentication/licensing module

    Data import/export module

    Web services module

    Print server module

As far as the language choice is concerned, if you want to work _natively_

on the Ipad, there ONLY ONE choice:

    https://developer.apple.com/xcode/

Everything else is simply _not native_.

Look around what others have been doing (in your software domain).

Ex. Good inspiring software:

     http://www.vendhq.com/

     https://www.openerp.com

My advice is to choose a language you feel comfortable to write in.

Follow http://news.ycombinator.com , for inspiration.

New languages are born with each day.

C#, Java, Python, Google Go, PHP, C++11, Dart, OCaml, Perl, Haskell

There are other IDEs than just Visual Studio:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qt_Creator

http://www.jetbrains.com/

http://xamarin.com/studio

https://netbeans.org/

http://www.eclipse.org/

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

I think you are missing the point. The concern for companies with large PB applications is that it will be EOL and get no support for future releases of windows.

At this point your application is no longer viable and would need to be replaced. Appeon does not solve this problem as the underlying software is the issue.

Having said that we have had the best support from SAP that I have experienced in many years. We have had bugs fixed! We have had special builds to resolve problems in a timely manner! Our customers are experiencing a high quality support, something that we have struggled to deliver with Sybase. This shows a certain commitment from SAP and I am slightly encouraged by this.

However, they need to make a statement about the future of PB and if they are going to support it into the future and for how long. Without this we have to assume the worst and commercially cannot stay with PB in the long term and in the short term need to be planning our move away. Even if SAP committed to support PB without any enhancements for say 10 years, this would stop the tide of evacuation that we are about to see.

If you are targeting different platforms then use a language appropriate to that platform (as Paolo has said). Your winform application does not suit mobile or web deployments and so you need to re-engineer the GUI anyway. You cannot use PB for everything, it's good for some things and not for others.

Right now though we need to hear from SAP.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Plenty of companies are still developing  with Powerbuilder 5,6,9, 11.5 (my company)

which have been out of support for a long time and we never really needed support

from Sybase or SAP. We never got bugs fixed even when we had support.

See the problem with floats.

The real problem for us will show up when the Win32 platform which still

lives inside Windows 8.1 will be taken away (new Windows Server

installs SYSWOW64 only optionally)

Depending on how large is your application, you may also find

transitory solutions.

Virtual machines still can host Windows XP, after all.

EOL for the IDE does _not_ justify a full software rewrite in most cases.

The program actually not running on new OSes, does.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi;

  AFAIK: John was reassigned to another SAP product and project about a year ago.

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

One of our clients had a key application running in Version 6, this stopped working after a SPK on windows XP and we were called in to bring it up-to-date.

You can never predict these events and commercial the risk it too high for large companies. I'm not saying that you will not be able to run version 12 code in the near future, but at some point you will have a problem. FUD causes management to ask you to move.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi David;

1) PB is already in the O/S "missed the boat" syndrome when it comes to W8, W2012 server and not to mention SQL Server 2012.

2) Appeon solves the immediate O/S problem as it completely converts your PB application source code into Java or C# (depending on your deployment model), XML and HTML. That also makes your application's 100% 64 bit, re-entrant & multi-thread compliant.

3) Appeon is moving forward and their Engineers are VERY PB internal savvy. Could Appeon develop their own IDE? Now there is an interesting question <bg>.

4) Appeon is already web & mobile - where as even with PB.Net (or as I say PB.Not), its nowhere close to being production ready let alone Web or Mobile. In fact (IMHO) Appeon enables us  to deploy native applications on the iOS platform and next month Android O/S as well ... which even beats the SUP product in many functional areas.

5) Appeon is already Amazon, RackSpace and Azure cloud compliant! SAP is focusing on NetWeaver and Hana Application & DB Server layers but missing the native application layer.

6) I'm not sure what support SAP gave you PB wise - but, from my Cdn government clients perspective - its "sucks".

=> Right now though we need to hear from SAP.

100% Agree ....  We need a clear Go/NoGo PB message so that IT shops can plan accordingly!

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

PS: And here is the PB.Net vs PB Classic (Native) statistics from my SourceForge site ( http://sourceforge.net/projects/stdfndclass )

Framework Downloads (past 6 months) ...

PB Classic: 859

PB.Net:  24

FYI: PB Classic Downloads (framework, examples, code snippets, etc) - as of today ...

PB Classic: 7,578

PB.Net:   136

From what I am seeing ... PB.Net is not going anywhere fast world wide.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

I take your point Chris, it is about deployment and Appeon does give a future there, that's an angle that I had not fully appreciated until now. The IDE does not matter that much after all we ran the PB10 on an XP virtual PC for years.

With regard to SAP support, I have this year had fixes to a number of issues that have arisen. All in PB 12 classic and in some cases EAServer specific problems.

We do purchase support for PB and EAS so would not expect less, but experience with Sybase was once a bug was identified you were stuffed. We have had to present a case by case justification for the fixes we got but once done the fix came quickly. We are pragmatic and do not force a quick fix for everything, if there is a work around then it can wait. As a result our customers are getting a very good service from us and SAP.

Perhaps the Cdn government would like to outsource support for their PB apps to Powersoft, as we get a good service. I have spent years building a positive relationship with the support team.

..... you can tell it's Friday

Cheers

David

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Chris,

You're a tremendous asset to the PB community and I'm just a regular guy.

You've documented your disdain for PB.Net ad nauseam. I respectfully disagree with you and wish you would give it a rest. I just don't think its productive.

I will however tolerate your daily beating of the Appeon drum (since that is a positive message). I swear you're on the payroll.

While PB.Net has its good and bad I think the idea is spot on: modernize PB apps (WPF) by bridging the gap from c/s to .Net. And oh by the way, here's this enormous framework at your disposal that is maintained for you by MS.

PB.Net suffers from the same problems that all releases of late suffer from: incompleteness and rush to market. I can't count how many times a new release got me excited only to let me down once I got my hands on it.

PB.Net had two mountains to climb: a brand new IDE that looks totally different (remember PB 7 fallout), and a audience resistant to learning something new. We are after all creatures of habit. I suspect most were hoping for a magic button that would change our 1990s implementations into 21st century's. I had the same ridiculous expectation.

PB is awesome for desktop apps. But times have changed and PB needs to change. PB.Net is/was the change. We need to change with it and support it and the company that produces it. The way I see it you have two options: Java or .Net. I think PB aligns with .Net better than Java but you and others may see things differently.

Just my 2c,

Mark

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Mark;

No, I am not on the Appeon payroll <LOL> seriously - but ...  have had a "ton" of success with Appeon Web & mobile. Interestingly enough - where also the main reason / motivation for many  government departments is ...

a) Movement to securing all business logic in the Application Server layer

b) zero desktop deployment (this is HUGE).

c) moving to either cloud and/or SAAS model

d) 64 bit compliancy

e) Most large government departments are J2EE based. So being .Net only would have been a "PB killer"!

f) support for "Protected B" and higher classed information (http://ssi-iss.tpsgc-pwgsc.gc.ca/questions/psi-isp-eng.html)

g) integration with Active Directory

etc, etc

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

I wish they had implemented Winforms within the PB.Net IDE. It may not be appropriate for every window in an app to be WPF. Why should I have to go through the complexities of WPF just to develop a rarely used options window or a small one input field popup.

WPF is great eye candy for Dave & John to give demos but in the real world they aren't always the best choice.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

I suspect that if they had continued developing PB.NEt Winforms would have been included as a target along with many others.

I agree; use the right tool for the job. Winforms has its place just like WPF, Web, console etc.

When you're being seduced you don't want to see blue jeans and a jacket.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Roland;

  I think way back before Sybase did PB.Net - the web aspect was in their minds. However, they thought ( and wrongly so) that Microsoft was going to supply a WPF to SilverLight cross compiler feature for the web. That way, any WPF application could be easily webified and Sybase would not have to do anything more from their side-of-the-fence.

  Now moving the time continuum forward to today we now see that Sybase was totally OTL on that rational because:

a) SilverLight was a MS only solution and the real world does not like that

b) HTML5 is where its at today

c) The WPF to SL cross compiler never materialized

d) SL of course is basically DOA

e) The dependance on WPF & WPF=>SL would have added a "ton" of unnecessary overhead to your applications

f)  WPF adds unnecessary complexity and can even hamper external technology integration

etc

You are correct  ... WPF is great "eye candy" but key business applications don't need that to survive or even come-to-life.

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Chris,

Its easy to have 20/20 when you look backwards. I bet you would've gotten in on some of that fruit stock Forrest Gump bought too.

Personally I think the strategy was very well thought out by Sybase at the time. How would they have known MS was going to do a 180 and go whole hog into mobile/ tablet.

a) SL is a cross browser solution provided by MS. The business world runs on MS.

b) Since you love polls you should do one on how many shops use HTML5 to run their business.

c) WPF to SL is a very small leap

d) The ONLY reason SL is dying is because MS chose to kill it.

e) How is the dependence on Appeon any different

f) Like Roland said not everything is a WPF solution but having the framework available to you gives you lots of options so you can use the right tool.

The business world is what puts food on my table. You can cater to the rest of the world.

Mark

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

   Well .. I could see the flaws in their approach and architecture as far back as Oct 2005 when we saw the .Net prototype for the 1st time. That was totally reconfirmed for me in PB.Net v1.0 Beta1 that I was on and I said so (which of course, did not make me a popular tester at the time  ) .

  Of course like our kids - no one listens to dad anyway <lol>!  

"If there are no women around and a man speaks in the forest ... is he still wrong?"  

[former_member185283 · Accepted solution]

Exactly David... the IDE does not matter much!  We have customers still using PB 6.5.  What matters is the runtime, which is 100% under Appeon's control when you deploy Web or Mobile.  We have the ability to not only fix any bug since we control the runtime, but we can even add new runtime features that are not in PB.  For example, when you deploy to mobile you will see you have new spin controls for date, you can use the camera to scan and decode a barcode, you can have GPS and mapping capability, etc.  Anyway, IDEs are commodity these days and should there be enough market demand for Appeon to provide an alternate IDE to the PB IDE then that is feasible technically speaking.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Chris,

Do yoy have any contacts in Europe, better in The Netherlands, that already have done a PB/Appeon project?

Kind regards

Hans

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Hans;

  I do not have any Appeon contacts in the Netherlands personally. However, I would suggest that you contact Armeen Mazda at Appeon or Christophe Dufourmontelle at Novalys (Appeon distributor located in Paris) and see who is on the customer list in that region. I am sure that one of these guys can help you.

Regards ... Chris

[former_member185283 · Accepted solution]

Hi Hans, We have an extremely large PB/Appeon project in the Netherlands.  It's in the government and deployed to about 30,000 users.  Please email me so I can put you in touch with the customer.  My email is armeen dot mazda at appeon dot com

[Former Member]

This whole thing went bad when Jim O'Neil left Sybase.  He is someone I have faith in and worked hard. The problems with Sybase and PowerBuilder have just gotten worse since that time.

Instead of just complaining, I wish I knew what to do to help the situation.

[Former Member]

Bob et Al;

    Your help here .... http://chrispollach.blogspot.ca/2013/08/hot-news-powerbuilder-petition-help.html

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member]

Anyone familiar with http://servoy.com

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dKHX63a1BUw

[Former Member]

The person who posted the video needs to learn the difference between losing and loosing.

[Former Member]

Losing is what is happening when your team is not doing well in the game. Loosing is like the more popular word releasing.

[Former Member]

Yes we are, for a few weeks now. We started a small project with Servoy to find out if this could replace PB in the future. Hope I can say more end of this year.

[Former Member]

I work in a small IT shop with 3 other PB developers. Three of us are in our middle-to-late 50's and one developer is 42. Our manager is facing a dilemma of how to find experienced PB developers when the time comes for us oldsters to retire in 5-10 years. He'd rather we put together a 2- or 3- year plan to rewrite our applications in a more mainstream platform so that he can hire developers at a more nominal cost. Most likely we will choose C# (or VB if everyone screams that C# is too hard to comprehend).

Is this rational thinking on our part? I think it is, for our company's sake.

[Former Member]

You could recruit young people and train them in PB, this is a very cost effective way of getting and keeping the skills. We have done this for many years and have a good solid teams of younger PB developers.

Can you be sure C# will exist in 10 years time?

You should look at the cost of re-factoring against the cost of recruiting and training. You may find the latter is more cost effective in the long term. Sadly you will also have to factor the life of PB and will support exist in 10 years time. Not an easy decision at the moment.

[Former Member]

given appeon is a quick solution for some but it is based on PB same as our applications. If sap does not support pb, appeon is in trouble too.

We need PB to provide 64 bit OS support, SQL Server 2014, Server 2012 R2, Azure support.

[Former Member]

Hi Guys;

  FWIW: If you have the time and can get to Ottawa on October 31, 2013 ... come and find out why Appeon is the best thing for PB since the the invention of "sliced bread"!

http://chrispollach.blogspot.ca/2013/09/osug.html

Regards ... Chris

[Former Member]

Sadly I cannot join you

[former_member185283]

Regardless of what SAP does Appeon is committed to PB customers, and both from a technology and business point of view we can deliver on this commitment!

From technology point of view Appeon has no real dependence on PB.  Appeon Web and Mobile applications rely on zero PB runtime comments and have no PB code.  It is using 100% industry standard technologies, such as Java or C# for the middle tier, HTML/JS for the Web UI, C++ for native mobile apps, etc.  Appeon has essentially created its own PBVM for Web and Mobile.

The only reliance Appeon has on PB is the design time/IDE.  Of course, IDEs are commodities these days, and there are a number of ways to swap our or replace the PB IDE that Appeon uses should there be market demand from Appeon customers for this feature.  In fact, you can see Sybase this this with the VisualStudio IDE option for PB.

Now as far as business side, sure, we are in the business of selling products and services to PowerBuilder customers.  But with over 15,000 companies using PB today, Appeon products that will help customers modernize their apps at fraction of cost and time of a rewrite, and Appeon services that help customers migrate to different languages such as Java should they decide that makes business sense, well I see a long future for Appeon!

[Former Member]

Hi Armeen,

I wish you and Appeon much success. Maybe you can persuade some of those 15k companies to sign Bruce's petition before TechWave. He only has about 2k signatures so far.

Mark

[Former Member]

Hi;

   You are here .... http://chrispollach.blogspot.ca/2013/08/hot-news-powerbuilder-petition-help.html

Regards ... Chris