Blog from September, 2012

Embeds are the greatest thing since sliced bread, right? How else are you going to insert your custom code where it needs to be? But embeds have gone horribly wrong, and Clarion developers everywhere are slowly killing their apps as a result. Don't be one of them.

A long time ago Dave Harms wrote a parser to extract embedded code from TXAs. Oddly enough, the code to do that was itself contained in embed points, thereby illustrating many of the worst aspects of embed usage. This is now the second refactoring of that code into a class, this time for compliance with the DevRoadmaps Clarion Library standards.

Usually when you use a class library compiled into a DLL you have to add the appropriate pair of defines to your app's project. Yes, templates make that easier. But if you ever get it wrong, you're going to have trouble. The DevRoadmaps Clarion Library (DCL) takes a completely different approach - at most you only ever need one define, and that's only if you forego the DCL library and want to compile in the classes directly

Three years ago Dave Harms wrote a series of articles on the problem with embeds, arguing that the worst thing you can do with your business logic is stuff it all in embed points. Which is, of course, what almost all of us do. Three years have brought some changes, and all of them have made Dave more opposed than ever to embed abuse. Read Part 1 in this updated series.

A recent newsgroup thread on C6 to C8 migration pointed out something that doesn't come up often, but can be an unbelievable pain when it does. If you have a space in your app name you'll get all kinds of strange and unpleasant compile errors. 

Just don't do that. 

Pete's two-parter on case sensitivity in PostgreSQL is posted in the WinDev articles section because it does have some WinDev-specific content, but if you're a Clarion dev don't let that stop you.  Pete has some great insights into case sensitivity in the data definition language and handling case sensitivity in sorts and data comparisons