What do you want out of the #PowerBuilder Developer’s Conference?

The following is an editorial that I originally prepared for the April edition of the PowerBuilder Developer's Journal.  The material is getting a bit dated, but I though some of it was worthwhile, so I'm posting it here.

Help convince SAP to take some positive action with regard toPowerBuilder

The post got dated incorrectly.  Here is the actual post.

http://brucearmstrong.wordpress.com/2013/08/07/help-convince-sap-to-take-some-positive-action-with-regard-to-powerbuilder/

What we learn from history...

Is that we don't learn anything from history. -- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

In October of 2007, SAP announced a deal to acquire Business Objects for 6.8 billion dollars. Three months later, Business Objects was renamed "Business Objects, an SAP company" allowed to run independently. After two years, Business Objects was completely assimilated into SAP and the products were rebranded as SAP Business Objects. The transition was not smooth however.

How to Use Pre-Compiled PowerBuilder.Net Assemblies

Another video I did for the SAP Database & Technology Academy.  For now I've uploaded to my own YouTube account, I'll update the blog when it gets posted in the Academy.

PB Assemblies are a new target type added in PowerBuilder.Net 12.5.  It addresses the need to be able to share framework libraries between PowerBuilder.Net targets (e.g., PFC).  Beginning with 12.1, it was possible to compile those framework libraries as a .Net Assembly, but that took a bit of work in order to resolve circular references and dealing with global variables.  With the addition of the PB Assembly, sharing framework libraries between PowerBuilder.Net applications became quite simple.

Credit has to go out to Yakov Werde, whose article in PBDJ on the topic was instrumental in helping me put the sample and the video together.

More on HTML5 versus native mobile apps....

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/troy-apps-bets-it-all-on-native-apps-for-mobile-business-rejects-html5-2013-05-16

Take away quotes:

"Troy Apps Software ... sees the move to native apps by big players such as LinkedIn, Facebook and others as the beginning of a landslide movement away from the use of web-based HTML5 for successful mobile business strategies."

Microsoft versus the Developers...

I can't add anything to what is said here except perhaps to note that it's what Adobe did too.  Line of Business (LOB) app developers?  What LOB developers?  With that:

http://www.i-programmer.info/professional-programmer/i-programmer/5880-microsoft-v-the-developers.html

Well, I guess this explains why the Syrians never hacked the PBDJ website....

We were going to take over the Onion website, but...