Re: Feasible to do a database project in MS Access + PL/1?

IBM's compiler has no native COM support, meaning there is neither a MIDL
compiler nor type library integration in the compiler. Furthermore, OO
PL/I's doesn't generate a C++ compatible vtable for virtual method dispatch,
so you have extra work there. Liant is even worse, as it doesn't even
implement full PL/I.

..NET requires a .NET compiler. There are none for PL/I.

You can call PL/I from VB. The effort involved in coding Access
functionality in PL/I is likely to be many times greater than that of
learning VB and doing your project in VB (VB meaning any of the 3 flavours),
especially when considering that Access was never designed for "line of
business" applications and was never positioned as such.

"Lady Margaret Thatcher" <Was_at_10_Downing_Street@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote
in message news:u4els1h2si3fmfhrj0a69co2vhg06rfuem@xxxxxxxxxx
> On Sun, 15 Jan 2006 09:54:06 +0100, "Mark Yudkin"
> <myudkinATcompuserveDOTcom@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>>Actually, Access does not rely on VBA. Although VBA is the macro language
>>in
>>Access, it is not the only way to code Access. I strongly recommend you
>>investigate the COM / .NET addin technology, which despite its possibly
>>misleading name, is a generic means of using any COM / .NET supporting
>>language to code Access. VB6 or VB.NET would be my recommendation.
>
>
> Thanks,
>
> I guess I'm getting into this deeper than I had expected to. :) :)
>
> However, as a (former) PL/1 programmer, I would have to learn to code
> Access. The books I have seen so far all teach VBA for coding Access.
> If I can't use PL/1, then I would probably use VBA just to minimize
> the number of "moving parts."
>
> Is IBM's VA PL/1 or Liant's PL/1 Com/.Net supporting? which version.
>
>
> Phil Burton
> philip-b@xxxxxxxxxxx
>
>
>>
>>"Lady Margaret Thatcher" <Was_at_10_Downing_Street@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>>wrote
>>in message news:nctfs1lsvo8obd14vcvso4ut2qjaol2dei@xxxxxxxxxx
>>> On Fri, 13 Jan 2006 10:57:25 +0100, "Mark Yudkin"
>>> <myudkinATcompuserveDOTcom@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>
>>>>Yes, but why bother? If you're going to use MS Access, then do the whole
>>>>job
>>>>in Access.
>>>
>>> Well, I will do as much as I in Access. But Access relies on VBA for
>>> business logic, and I will definitely need to create some logic to
>>> properly handle the five sub-types within my database.
>>>>
>>>>If you need a database, then remember that Access isn't one, it's a
>>>>desktop
>>>>productivity application that comes together with Word, Excel etc. in
>>>>Microsoft's Office range. Microsoft's database is SQL Server, which also
>>>>has
>>>>a "personal" / "desktop" version (aka MSDE - Microsoft Desktop Engine).
>>>
>>> Understood. But I must say that as a productivity tool, Access is
>>> pretty awful. There is no way the average office worker can use
>>> Access, the way that people can learn to use Word or Excel or even
>>> Outlook by experimentation, reading the help files, and asking
>>> co-workers.
>>>
>>> For my single-user, non-shared purposes, however, Access will suffice.
>>> A very rough calculation is that my database will grow to 5 MB or so.
>>>>
>>>>Once you've decided on your requirements, ask again.
>>>
>>> I had thought that I had decided on a plan and was asking about
>>> feasibility, meaning can I use PL/1 instead of VBA, and in a Windows
>>> XP environment.
>>>
>>> If this plan is infeasible, then I will have to learn VBA
>>>
>>> It appears that IBM VA PL/1 would work for me. The "only issue" is
>>> the price!!!"
>>>
>>> I hope this clarifies.
>>>
>>> Phil Burton
>>> philip-b@xxxxxxxxxxx
>>>
>>>
>>>>
>>>>"Lady Margaret Thatcher" <Was_at_10_Downing_Street@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>>>>wrote
>>>>in message news:p8v8s156atpe2248mhrntshondj23k6r5n@xxxxxxxxxx
>>>>> This is both a start of a new thread to ask some questions from a new
>>>>> person to this group, and also a reply to a recent thread.
>>>>>
>>>>> To introduce myself, despite my pseudonym (for net privacy) I once did
>>>>> a LOT of scientific and engineering programming in PL/1 (and PL/C). I
>>>>> even used PL/1 for DOS briefly, and I still have those manuals along
>>>>> with my mainframe PL/1 manuals. I also still have the "PL/1 for
>>>>> Fortran Users" booklet that IBM published in the mid-60s. All my
>>>>> other programming manuals have been long recycled or given away.
>>>>> That's how important PL/1 was to me.
>>>>>
>>>>> I was a graduate student at MIT in the 1970s, and I remember quite
>>>>> well the Multics project, but all my class projects were done on the
>>>>> IBM/370 system (because that is where the user accounts were
>>>>> established.) Quite coincidentally, I worked briefly with Tom Van
>>>>> Vleck in the 90s. At the time, I knew he was one of the better
>>>>> software engineers I'd worked with, but I had no idea of his
>>>>> involvement with Multics and PL/1.
>>>>>
>>>>> To further introduce myself I haven't done any real programming on PCs
>>>>> since commercial software has generally met my needs. But I now want
>>>>> to create a database for myself that would catalog about 10 to 15
>>>>> thousand items. There are about five significant sub-types for these
>>>>> items, and my database would have a different set of fields for each
>>>>> of the subtypes, with a few fields in common for all the sub-types.
>>>>>
>>>>> Not wishing to get into Microsoft vs. Open Source issues here, but for
>>>>> my purposes MS Access + Visual Basic for Applications on Windows XP
>>>>> has been recommended to me as a better choice than LAMP. Rather than
>>>>> learn VBA, I would __much rather__ use Pl/1, which I strongly
>>>>> preferred over my original programming language, Fortran.
>>>>>
>>>>> Before writing this post, I subscribed to this group and downloaded
>>>>> and read through all the 400-plus posts available from my ISP. I
>>>>> also did some Google searching, went through Robin Vowel's site, and
>>>>> some others, etc. Reading through applicable web pages and newsgroup
>>>>> postings, I'm now aware of the alternatives, although I'm not sure
>>>>> which alternatives are feasible, let alone desirable. Recall that for
>>>>> me, I wish to use PL/1 in a Windows XP environment, so that MS Access
>>>>> thinks it is working with Visual Basic for Applications.
>>>>>
>>>>> Is my Access + PL/1 approach feasible???? What would you recommend to
>>>>> me if _cost were not an issue_? I'm not adverse to spending
>>>>> reasonable amounts of money and I'm not allergic to emulators.
>>>>> However, I suspect that the requirement to work with MS Access makes
>>>>> that approach infeasible. Emulation under VMWare?
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm aware of IBM and Liant commercial products for PL/1 and the
>>>>> Sourceforge project pligcc. I'm also aware of DR and kednos PL/1.
>>>>>
>>>>> If this Access + PL/1 environment is even feasible, how do I go about
>>>>> reducing costs while still maintaining my environment? My project is
>>>>> absolutely non-commercial. Would some serious groveling work? Or it
>>>>> is possible to buy software licenses from someone no longer using the
>>>>> software in question. Or is pligcc ready for "production?
>>>>>
>>>>> I should also add that I'm not about to buy a used VAX, even a
>>>>> microVAX. Too much hardware around the house as it is.
>>>>>
>>>>> In advance thanks.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Sun, 01 Jan 2006 18:37:17 GMT, multicsfan <multicsfan@xxxxxxxxxxx>
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Peter Flass wrote:
>>>>>>> Tom Linden wrote:
>>>>>>[snip]
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> From limited knowledge I'd thing Ada is more of a niche language
>>>>>>> than
>>>>>>> PL/I, being largely (AFAIK) confined to defense and similar markets.
>>>>>>> PL/I has more breath (sp?) of use but probably not much more depth.
>>>>>>> I'd like to see this change in the future. PL/I is superior to C
>>>>>>> (probably no argument here), and could surpass C++ with a few
>>>>>>> additions,
>>>>>>> as Peter's paper shows. Now that hardware is no longer too limited
>>>>>>> to
>>>>>>> support PL/I effectively, I'd like to see it move in on C, due to
>>>>>>> its
>>>>>>> obvious superiority.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>The biggest reason C took over was C compilers were free or low cost
>>>>>>compared to PL/1. Gcc is free and runs on just about everything. I
>>>>>
>>>>> As an aside, which was one of the reasons that TCP/IP was universally
>>>>> adopted in the late 80s/early 90s, a pre-cursor to the Open Source vs.
>>>>> Proprietary issues of the current time. Back then, the "proprietary"
>>>>> was the Open System Interconnect, or OSI. Best known parts of OSI
>>>>> were probably X.400 email, X.25 network communications, and X.500
>>>>> directory service, which is the sort-of basis for LDAP. Lots of major
>>>>> governments favored OSI. But you had to spend hundreds of dollars
>>>>> just to get the manuals from the CCITT. OSI applications like X.400
>>>>> were also very complex compared to the "simplicity" of SMTP. It is
>>>>> interesting, however, to observe how much X.400 functionality has
>>>>> found its way into TCP/IP email.
>>>>>
>>>>>>looked at buying a PL/1 compiler several times, but each time I was
>>>>>>able
>>>>>>to afford to pay more, the price went up just outside what I was
>>>>>>willing
>>>>>>to pay. The first one I was able to afford was the IBM Personal which
>>>>>>at that time was OS/2 only and I could not get OS/2 to load on my
>>>>>>computer.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>


.

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