At 14:10 28.12.2000 -0700, Jason wrote:

>I would like to solicit the opinions of others on why you chose IBO over IBX
>and what the advantages you feel that you enjoy by having made that choice.

Sorry for this late reply, but I wanted to get through all mails before I
answered (and the list has surely been active since I left for holiday 21
December).

The reason I "chose" IBO was simply that Aage J. (who is my boss) told me
to use it when I got employed two years ago. The prime advantage I feel by
having made that "choice", is to have become part of a very live community.
I've never tried IBX and cannot compare them, but using IBO has been a
pleasure. Last autumn (fall for you Americans) I got involved in my first
somewhat demanding programming task, and I was impressed myself at how
quickly I programmed! Parts of this I attribute to IBO which contained all
the components I needed and they all worked once I found the right way to
use them. I see no reason whatsoever to try IBX when IBO is:

-rock solid
-comprehensive (I've only used a fraction of the components)
-fast

The only drawback with IBO is its enormous richness - although it works
great, I'm sure most of what I do could have been done even more efficient
had I known how to use all the properties.

I guess this richness is one reason for many to turn down IBO - there's
nowhere saying that you just use an IB_Connection, IB_Transaction and
IB_Cursor/IB_Query, connect them to eachother, fill in the SQL part, calls
First, Edit/Insert, Post, Next and occationally an IB_Transaction.Commit
and you're up and running with IBO. How's a newbie supposed to know that it
isn't neccessary to understand InvalidateSql, or use JoinLinks if you use
the proper SQL syntax. For that reason, I think Paul Gallagher's suggestion
seems great:

Paul wrote:

>I just had a brainstorm (more of a drizzle really). Offer a "stripped down"
>version of IBO. Include only the basic TDataset data access and maybe some
>of the bars. Basically, make it as comparable as possible to IBX. Include
>the full source of the stripped version to satisfy the corporate buyers. And
>make it FREE.

and Jason replied:

>Making a stripped down version goes against my grain. Remember, IBO is
>trustware which means anyone who asks can have the full source.

I must admit I haven't looked up grain in my dictionary and only knows it
from the biblical "unless a grain of wheat", but I'll assume it means profit.

For you, a stripped down version must sound like "remove all the goodies",
but for newbies it's more like "something simple better than the BDE"! For
them, the full source is simply too full to be appreciated! A free "IBO for
newbies" shouldn't include more than TIBOTable, TIBOQuery with published
properties that's already in the BDE (excepting the GeneratorLinks, which
is neccessary for proper use of generators), plus an IB_Connection and an
IB_Transaction component (and those should have hidden a few
properties/events as well). The idea wouldn't be to make a product that's
"great and solves all your problems", just enough to be used for converting
a simple BDE program to "IBO for newbies". There're several benefits to
this for new users:

-easy to understand
-easy to compare to the BDE
-gives a foretast of what IBO full version must be

I don't agree with Paul that you should include the source code, nor give
any support apart from quoting this list. We're talking of an "advertising
version" which works, but whose main aim is to attract potential customers
and really isn't much use for serious programming beyond the first two
weeks (which the suggested name also implies).

Hope I managed to convince you - if not, maybe you could run a poll on
egroups asking whether we feel we master IBO or not? I guess I'm not alone
feeling I still have a long way to go (maybe all the way to Frankfurt).

Set