1. Don Olliver
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. Friday, 1 June 2018 21:28 PM UTC

The "New Features in PB 2017" page in online help includes this subtopic:

Classified features

While new features are added in PowerBuilder, some of the existing features might no longer be needed or recommended for use. You will find the following three classifications of features in the PowerBuilder Help.

  • Discontinued - feature that has been completely removed from the product.

    For example, EAServer projects/targets, PowerBuilder .NET IDE, and Windows Form projects/targets are discontinuedfeatures.

  • Obsolete - feature that is available, but is no longer eligible for technical support and will no longer be enhanced.

    For example, Web DataWindow is an obsolete feature.

  • Stable – feature that is available and is still eligible for technical support, but will no longer be enhanced.

    For example, .NET Assembly is a stable feature.

 

Does this mean .NET assembly targets will eventually be deprecated? How long will they be eligible for technical support?

Thank you,

Don Olliver

 

Armeen Mazda @Appeon Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Friday, 1 June 2018 23:25 PM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # 1

The .NET assemblies and .NET web services features are being totally revamped.  So the features themselves will be still in the product, but the current implementation you see in PowerBuilder 2017 R2 is deprecated.  In PowerBuilder 2018 it will be replaced with this: http://showcase.appeon.com 

Compared to the current implementation, the new implementation will offer several notable benefits:

1. Much less coding than before, take a look at the source code of this example: http://showcase.appeon.com/performance_1_111.html

2. No more SQL coding (i.e. embedded SQL) and automated validation, take a look at the source code of this example: http://showcase.appeon.com/performance_1_105.html

3. Much faster performance than before, take a look at these live performance benchmarks: http://showcase.appeon.com/performance_1_111.html

4. Total interoperability with other .NET languages, tools, libraries, etc. since you are coding 100% in C#

5. Supports deployment to Linux or Windows since it is powered by the .NET Core and 100% managed code

6. Automatically generates REST/JSON/OAuth Web APIs, which is a newer and more popular standard than SOAP

Comment
  1. Armeen Mazda @Appeon
  2. Sunday, 3 June 2018 22:57 PM UTC
DataWindows/DataStores can be automatically migrated to C# DataStores, but the PowerScript needs to be rewritten as C#.  Take a look at this 4-minute video: https://youtu.be/cglOa-PIHBg  The effort should not be so bad if your logic is already partitioned in NVOs since the C# DataStore offers practically all the same functions and properties. 

  1. Helpful
  1. Don Olliver
  2. Monday, 4 June 2018 14:26 PM UTC
Armeen,



We have a significant amount of code invested in the current .NET assembly implementation. It will take some time to move to the PB 2018 method.





By 'deprecated', do you mean the current implementation will still be available in PB 2018 but not recommended? Or will it be completely removed and replaced with the new implementation?

 

Once PB 2017 R3 is released, how long will support continue for PB 2017 R2?





Thanks,



Don

  1. Helpful
  1. Armeen Mazda @Appeon
  2. Monday, 4 June 2018 16:50 PM UTC
1. Sorry for not being consistent with the documentation terminology.  When I say deprecated I mean "obsolete", and technically it is sill classified as "stable" because we haven't changed its status to "obsolete" yet.  So you don't need to worry it will be completely removed from the product (i.e. "discontinued") anytime in the foreseeable future, but just consider our product roadmap in your project decisions and try to migrate over as soon as you can.



2. I would strongly recommend you upgrade to PB 2017 R3 when it is a released because it will be our long-term support (LTS) version.  Please read our EOL policy (https://www.appeon.com/products/eol-policy.html) to understand how long a standard verision is supported (e.g. PB 2017 R2) vs. a LTS version.  It should be a relatively low-risk and easy upgrade since it is a revision.  



 

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