Latest announcements by Microsoft executives leave no doubt. Microsoft is shifting its support to HTML 5 and by doing so gives up on its RIA platform Silverlight which it repurposes for mobile. Adobe releases a Beta of a new HTML5 supporting tool kit, and by doing so also embraces the HTML5 option. It does look as if both give in to the market preferences for standard, no-plug-in and non-propriety option of HTML5 (see "Microsoft favoring HTML5 over Silverlight: reports" ).
If we follow Microsoft's early announcements when launching Silverlight, Microsoft pointed out the value of Silverlight in two aspects: The first was the graphics and media richness it enables while the second was the .Net developer's quest for a simpler, .Net based RIA development.
In a new world where HTML 5 replaces Silverlight and Flash in providing a solution for the quest for standard rich internet, the second quest for simple .Net based development of rich Internet application is left unattended (now that Silverlight is off the shelf and no longer serves as RIA, developed the .NET way). Reading developers' reaction following Microsoft PDC in October 2010 is probably the best way to learn about the impact of this announcement:
"Silverlight is dead, quite a surprise they have for us in PDC this year. I think most devs arround the world were expecting just the opposite, the Silverlight 5 announce. I think Microsoft should had been more honest and recognize the big mistake they made, wasting so much time and resources in a technology that is never going to be used massively. I assume my mistake as a developer for the resources I invested in Silverlight. The most sad thing is there aren’t any tools for HTML 5 in .NET, those four years of Silverlight left us with the hands empty. I think is time to move to GTW, every evidence is screaming that Google is the future." (Quoted from this blog)
I must express my humble opinion here and say that there might be more to the Silverlight twist (and Flash) than meets the eye. It might also be a result of slow adoption rate in the business sector that pays for its applications (vs. the consumer that does not). Being in the business RIA market for some odd years, I have been hearing quite too often enterprise CIOs saying that they will not allow plug-in RIA solution for security reasons, no matter if it is Microsoft's or Adobe's. I have been also hearing enterprise CIOs complaining about the stiff learning curve and lack of productivity that the new RIA solutions impose. I have been hearing them complaining about the hardship of data binding and I have been hearing them complaining about slow response time of applications written with the new Ajax based RIA solution.
Visual WebGui does support HTML development the .NET way, and naturally supports HTML5
We have been there for the last 3 years, betting on HTML by boosting ASP.NET Ajax development and runtime and indeed, being highly rewarded by market opinion leaders, adoption and traction. We have been enabling the classic VB6-like desktop development paradigms for HTML based front-ends. And now more than ever it seems like we are here to collect the big prize. Visual WebGui enables the best of .NET simple and structured development paradigms for HTML5. Exactly where Microsoft has been aiming with Silverlight, but we target open standards non-propriety platform. And that is a big difference.
So dear developer, Silverlight might be dying but it is not necessarily Google GWT that you must migrate to. If you are a .NET developer, I do believe that it is Visual WebGui you are looking for. You will have the best, well entrenched .Net development practices only this time targeting the RIA winner HTML5 and JavaScript.
11/02/2010
9/15/2010
Airline Maintenance Logistics System Moved to Web
"Developers who were intimidated by the move to the world of web development immediately turned enthusiastic with the new project in Visual WebGui because they could feel useful again." Toni Garcias, WinForms developer at OA6 whose team had to find a solution that would allow them to enable local and remote users to use enterprise information and give feedback and centralize and normalize information. The team evaluated Visual WebGui for building the integrated extranet/intranet tools for their system.
"We were trying different Asp.Net solutions with third party frameworks, but the learning curves were excessive for our needs", said Project Manager Toni Garcias and added that "We finally chose Visual WebGui because also VB6/Windows Forms developers without Asp.Net experience where capable of building VWG Forms and give it functionality in a very short time. Developers who were intimidated by the move to the world of web development immediately turned enthusiastic with the new project in Visual WebGui because they could feel useful again." Web designers and illustrators also found the way to integrate themselves into the VWG framework.
The OA6 team who worked with Visual WebGui stated that performance was fully satisfactory and since security is by design there was no need to work on additional solutions for securing the end points. They also admired the possibility to show homogenous information to extranet/intranet users, from very different local resources as MS Access databases, SQL Server databases, Excel files, digitalized files, etc.
If you are a desktop developer who is looking to build some web applications you might find that article very interesting and useful.
Click here to read how Airline Maintenance Logistics System Moved to Web by OA6
"We were trying different Asp.Net solutions with third party frameworks, but the learning curves were excessive for our needs", said Project Manager Toni Garcias and added that "We finally chose Visual WebGui because also VB6/Windows Forms developers without Asp.Net experience where capable of building VWG Forms and give it functionality in a very short time. Developers who were intimidated by the move to the world of web development immediately turned enthusiastic with the new project in Visual WebGui because they could feel useful again." Web designers and illustrators also found the way to integrate themselves into the VWG framework.
The OA6 team who worked with Visual WebGui stated that performance was fully satisfactory and since security is by design there was no need to work on additional solutions for securing the end points. They also admired the possibility to show homogenous information to extranet/intranet users, from very different local resources as MS Access databases, SQL Server databases, Excel files, digitalized files, etc.
If you are a desktop developer who is looking to build some web applications you might find that article very interesting and useful.
Click here to read how Airline Maintenance Logistics System Moved to Web by OA6
8/16/2010
New Knowledge Base launched
Visual WebGui revealed yesterday its allnew resource center. The new Knowledge Base seems like a huge leap forward in terms of the user experience for supporting developers and a much easier access to relevant resources as the new system incorporates all of the Visual WebGui resources in one place back up by an advanced interface (search and filter mechanism) to ease on finding relevant information.
The new KB system presents some important new features and capabilities such as:
* Better and more diversed categorization and filtering options
* Easy search
* On the fly filtering for search results
* Contributors recognition
* and more
Visual WebGui also promises to continuously improve the Knowledge Base by adding more features and upgrading the overall user experience and allow developers to find all the essential information needed for creating VWG apps according to best practices.
The new Knowledge Base is located here:
The new KB system presents some important new features and capabilities such as:
* Better and more diversed categorization and filtering options
* Easy search
* On the fly filtering for search results
* Contributors recognition
* and more
Visual WebGui also promises to continuously improve the Knowledge Base by adding more features and upgrading the overall user experience and allow developers to find all the essential information needed for creating VWG apps according to best practices.
The new Knowledge Base is located here:
8/10/2010
I would like to present a showcase where there was a need for an enhanced web based solution with a user interface (UI) similar to the previous desktop solution UI. The new solution was needed as a replacement of the desktop client-based solution of a Software Vendor.
The developer, Luca Morelli, evaluated various Ajax frameworks for this project such as the ASP.NET Ajax Control Toolkit and Gaia Ajax for ASP.NET but decided to go with Visual WebGui because it could provide a desktop-like user experience and allowed to implementing additional functionalities over the original solution with ease and reduce the learning time for the user.
The solution needed to be migrated to web was a VB content management with parametric document layout and workflow definition for small medium companies that need to organize the approval of internal documents.
The application should provide each customer with a customized type of documents, types of data, fields (with data coming generally from external programs) and set of rules. It should also allow configuring roles and workflows that are not very complex but unique for each of them, so there was a need for a solution that would allow configuration capabilities of the system to create and import documents based on their need and approve with their rules.
Read full article >
The developer, Luca Morelli, evaluated various Ajax frameworks for this project such as the ASP.NET Ajax Control Toolkit and Gaia Ajax for ASP.NET but decided to go with Visual WebGui because it could provide a desktop-like user experience and allowed to implementing additional functionalities over the original solution with ease and reduce the learning time for the user.
The solution needed to be migrated to web was a VB content management with parametric document layout and workflow definition for small medium companies that need to organize the approval of internal documents.
The application should provide each customer with a customized type of documents, types of data, fields (with data coming generally from external programs) and set of rules. It should also allow configuring roles and workflows that are not very complex but unique for each of them, so there was a need for a solution that would allow configuration capabilities of the system to create and import documents based on their need and approve with their rules.
Read full article >
7/26/2010
With Visual WebGui 6.4 RC0 version, Gizmox brings its vision of solving data-intensive Ajax web development & deployment pains, to completion
Visual WebGui which was designed to solve the most painful issues for enterprise IT is now with its new 6.4 RC0 version fullfiling its promise to reproduce client/server richness and user experience on Web and Cloud, in a simple cost effective way.
Since its inception in 2007, Gizmox has been working towards the release of its fully featured Visual WebGui (VWG) version. Up until this release of 6.4 Gizmox has released 6 major versions and with this version Gizmox is delivering on the VWG promise to enable a full cycle of rapid development of enterprise level data-intensive Ajax application.
"VWG was designed to solve what might be the most painful issues for enterprise IT; reproducing client/server richness and user experience on Web and Cloud, in a simple cost effective way and with standard Web, no-plug-in accessibility and absolutely secured end point. We took upon ourselves one of the most ambitious missions, one that the big software players could not solve," says Navot Peled, Gizmox CEO and adds "The goal was to create an end-to-end Web and Cloud solution that simplifies enterprise Ajax development experience to a VB6 level using Ajax methodologies to reproduce client/server richness and user experience on Web while enabling absolutely unhackable Ajax UI and one that also enables creative UI designs without the need to struggle with complex HTML, JavaScript and CSS styling. We wanted to make developers really feel at home, so we decided to expose 2 basic development experiences: one that leverages desktop developers' skills, providing Form based VB6-like development experience and one that leverages web developers' skills, with declarative XAML experience. The first one we call VWG application and the second is VWG sites. Visual WebGui 6.4 is the first version to fully deliver on that promise."
VWG has been collecting awards on its innovative approach and achievements, as well as rewarded with developers and enterprises responses and feedbacks. Its SDK has been downloaded more than 700,000 times within 2 years and there are over 35,000 VWG applications that were developed with its pre-release, partly featured SDK.
The innovative technology of Visual WebGui has been recognized by many individuals and organizations altogether approving the company's innovation, solid reputation and thought leadership it brings to the industry. In 2010 Visual WebGui was awarded with a couple of technological prizes such as the inclusion in 2010 SD Times 100 which recognizes "a noble gathering of leaders" in various software areas. Visual WebGui was also listed as one of the "Coolest Cloud Platform Vendors" by UBM's Channel Web magazine stating that the Visual WebGui platform is a way to enable enterprises to create rich and responsive Web applications with solid performance and security.
The new version's free & free trial downloads are available visualwebgui.com.
Since its inception in 2007, Gizmox has been working towards the release of its fully featured Visual WebGui (VWG) version. Up until this release of 6.4 Gizmox has released 6 major versions and with this version Gizmox is delivering on the VWG promise to enable a full cycle of rapid development of enterprise level data-intensive Ajax application.
"VWG was designed to solve what might be the most painful issues for enterprise IT; reproducing client/server richness and user experience on Web and Cloud, in a simple cost effective way and with standard Web, no-plug-in accessibility and absolutely secured end point. We took upon ourselves one of the most ambitious missions, one that the big software players could not solve," says Navot Peled, Gizmox CEO and adds "The goal was to create an end-to-end Web and Cloud solution that simplifies enterprise Ajax development experience to a VB6 level using Ajax methodologies to reproduce client/server richness and user experience on Web while enabling absolutely unhackable Ajax UI and one that also enables creative UI designs without the need to struggle with complex HTML, JavaScript and CSS styling. We wanted to make developers really feel at home, so we decided to expose 2 basic development experiences: one that leverages desktop developers' skills, providing Form based VB6-like development experience and one that leverages web developers' skills, with declarative XAML experience. The first one we call VWG application and the second is VWG sites. Visual WebGui 6.4 is the first version to fully deliver on that promise."
VWG has been collecting awards on its innovative approach and achievements, as well as rewarded with developers and enterprises responses and feedbacks. Its SDK has been downloaded more than 700,000 times within 2 years and there are over 35,000 VWG applications that were developed with its pre-release, partly featured SDK.
The innovative technology of Visual WebGui has been recognized by many individuals and organizations altogether approving the company's innovation, solid reputation and thought leadership it brings to the industry. In 2010 Visual WebGui was awarded with a couple of technological prizes such as the inclusion in 2010 SD Times 100 which recognizes "a noble gathering of leaders" in various software areas. Visual WebGui was also listed as one of the "Coolest Cloud Platform Vendors" by UBM's Channel Web magazine stating that the Visual WebGui platform is a way to enable enterprises to create rich and responsive Web applications with solid performance and security.
The new version's free & free trial downloads are available visualwebgui.com.
7/21/2010
Infospectrum goes Green with automated recruitment & interview HR system
Recruitment and interview process usually becomes complicated and very hard to follow with massive exchange of emails, bulky attachments and several people involved. So it was decided to develop a system that would simplify that process by allowing to find required information at a touch of a key - a web-based workflow-based application to automate the process without any need to install software on the client.
The solution also needed to provide automated workflow to route tasks to the relevant performers and notify them by e-mail. It also needed to capture the important data in the process so that some intelligent reports could be generated from it. And last but not least, an appealing user interface goes a long way towards application acceptability. The users needed a user interface which was intuitive and easy to use.
"The rich user interface, powerful features and high performance of the tool impressed us and it was an easy decision to use VWG as a development framework instead of the traditional ASP.NET approach," said Project Manager Vijay Phulwadhawa.
The learning curve for the development team was minimal since they were mostly desktop application experts and as such were familiar with the concepts and ptactices allowed by the Visual WebGui solution that they chose as their framework.. "The ease of development of the UI with Visual WebGui is just amazing! During the project execution, we have seen desktop developers who never worked in web applications learn the framework and be productive in record time. The hassles of JavaScript, Ajax, and HTML are absent which increases productivity many folds," added Phulwadhawa.
7/07/2010
Redcastle specializes in Business Management Solutions usually based around an established CRM product. The company struggled to make a Web Application with the same user experience as the Windows client.
As a result, Redcastle looked for a solution that would allow the development of web modules that fit the user experience of their Windows client CRM system. Redcastle lead developer James Carter encountered Visual WebGui for the first time via a web advertisement which promised a rapid conversion of VB6 applications. Carter who was a bit skeptical at first decided to give Visual WebGui a try. Carter then downloaded Visual WebGui and found that "they did have a web based ListView control that did everything that the Windows control was capable of and much, much more!"
After a short evaluation it proved to be exactly what the people at Redcastle were after; a platform that allowed building and running of Windows based applications in a pure web environment.
"Using Visual WebGui our development times have been vastly reduced," said Lead Developer James Carter who continued that "adding a new list to a page/form is as simple as dragging a new control from the toolbox, and with only a few lines of code you have a list/table that supports row selection (no code required), column-click sorting (amazingly absolutely no code at all to achieve this), pagination, column repositioning via drag-drop (again totally free, no coding required), allowing the user to decide which columns to see and which to hide - all at the speed of light!. Using standard ASPX this would have taken much longer."
Read more...
As a result, Redcastle looked for a solution that would allow the development of web modules that fit the user experience of their Windows client CRM system. Redcastle lead developer James Carter encountered Visual WebGui for the first time via a web advertisement which promised a rapid conversion of VB6 applications. Carter who was a bit skeptical at first decided to give Visual WebGui a try. Carter then downloaded Visual WebGui and found that "they did have a web based ListView control that did everything that the Windows control was capable of and much, much more!"
After a short evaluation it proved to be exactly what the people at Redcastle were after; a platform that allowed building and running of Windows based applications in a pure web environment.
"Using Visual WebGui our development times have been vastly reduced," said Lead Developer James Carter who continued that "adding a new list to a page/form is as simple as dragging a new control from the toolbox, and with only a few lines of code you have a list/table that supports row selection (no code required), column-click sorting (amazingly absolutely no code at all to achieve this), pagination, column repositioning via drag-drop (again totally free, no coding required), allowing the user to decide which columns to see and which to hide - all at the speed of light!. Using standard ASPX this would have taken much longer."
Read more...
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