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                    *          DB/C Newsletter          *
                    *             July 2004             *
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                              News and Comments

     We've finished coding DB/C DX 13.1, but we're still working on the
changes to the documentation.  We like to provide relatively complete
documentation for beta testing, so beta testing has not started yet.  We
now expect to start beta testing of DB/C DX 13.1 the first week in August.

     This month's article again discusses one of my favorite topics - Eclipse.
Eclipse is rapidly becoming the best integrated development environment, not
just on par with Microsoft Visual Studio, but in many areas far surpassing
Visual Studio.  As time goes by, I become more and more convinced that the
decision to move the DB/C DX development tools to this platform was a good
decision.  Eclipse is really a great thing!

     This month's article is about the new features of Eclipse 3.0 which
was released on June 25.

     A future newsletter will discuss the new features in the DB/C DX 13.1
DDT which works in conjunction with Eclipse 3.0.  If you want to use Eclipse
3.0 now, you'll need to participate in the DX 13.1 beta test program.  Send
us an email at support@dbcsoftware.com to sign up.

                                                     don.wills@dbcsoftware.com

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                                 Eclipse 3.0

     There are hundreds of changes and new features in Eclipse 3.0.  Many
of the new features are specific to Java, but a large number of the changes
affect development with other language development toolkits like DDT (our
acronym for the DB/C DX development toolkit).

     The most visible change in Eclipse 3.0 is its look-and-feel.  Most of
the visual elements of Eclipse are native elements - that is, they are the
native controls, windows, menus, etc., that are provided by the operating
system that they are running on.  However, some of the visual elements
necessary to make Eclipse useful aren't available, or aren't quite right
for Eclipse.  For example, the multiple window panel feature of Eclipse
doesn't quite match with Windows MDI interface.  The paneling of windows
inside the main Eclipse window is actually drawn by Eclipse itself.

     So some of the visual elements in Eclipse 3.0 now have a new look.
This new look-and-feel is similar to the new Windows XP look-and-feel.  In
general, these changes are good - they allow Eclipse to be more responsive
and more indicative of the actual state of things.  And if you don't like
the new look, several of the specific details can be made to look as they
did in Eclipse 2.1 by changing Eclipse preferences.

     Although not visible to the end user, a major change was made to how
the feature and plugin structure of Eclipse works.  The change is that
Eclipse is now based on the OSGi framework specification.  I suspect this
means nothing to most readers, but it is important.  Essentially it is
the first step toward allowing a completely dynamic structure for plugins.
If the feature or plugin supports the new framework functions, you won't
have to restart Eclipse after you've added or updated a feature of Eclipse.

     A new aspect of Eclipse 3.0 is called the Rich Client Platform (RCP).
Again, readers of the newsletter won't be directly affected by this feature,
but it is important to understand.  Essentially RCP is a stripped-down version
of Eclipse that can be used as the basis for building your own applications.
So if you like how windows, views, toolbars, preferences, etc. work in Eclipse
and would like to adapt your application into the Eclipse framework without
having any of the programmer baggage included (yours would be the only
perspective!), you should look into building an Eclipse RCP Java application.

     Some of the new features of Eclipse 3.0 are directly useful to DB/C DX
developers.  Here is a short list:

  . The perspective dock can now be placed at the right side of the toolbar,
    freeing up valuable horizontal space.
  . The text editor find and replace function now includes support for
    regular expressions.
  . The overflow handling of tabs at the top of the editor panel now
    easily handles dozens of open editors.
  . There is a new Synchronize View for users of CVS that doesn't require
    changing to the Team Perspective to see what changes have been made to
    which program files.
  . CVS operations can now run in the background.
  . There is a new Search View for searching files which can run in the
    background.
  . The global replace function has been enhanced to be interactive,
    and to support regular expressions.
  . The update and install feature capability has been improved.

     To see a list of all of the new features (including pictures!), click
on the "What's new in 3.0" link on the Eclipse home page at www.eclipse.org.


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                          DB/C DX Class Schedule

   Class:     DB/C DX Fundamentals
   Date:      September, 2004
   Location:  to be determined

For information, send email to admin@dbcsoftware.com.


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