The recent momentum in Sybase and their technologies--as evidenced by the successful Build the Future tours and the industry's favorable reviews--all point to a major revival of Sybase and PowerBuilder. In the application server jungle, the king is not a lion - it's a Jaguar! Read this book and learn how to unleash the power in your enterprise.
Information Technology (IT) managers, system architects, and developers using many different technologies can learn about distributed computing and explore how PowerBuilder can be used as a total solution--or as part of the answer to building your distributed applications--with this book. In addition, this book can help answer the questions: Why should I move to a distributed architecture? and/or How do I design and build distributed applications with Jaguar CTS? A detailed overview of the Jaguar CTS application server is also given, allowing the reader to evaluate the technology.
This book, however, is dedicated to bringing PowerBuilder developers up to speed quickly on how to design and develop components for use on the Jaguar CTS application server. If you are a developer who wants to extend your skills beyond the two-tier client/server architecture, this book was written with you in mind. This book will walk the developer through the steps of creating a simple application and build on this, teaching the reader the techniques required to build full-featured applications. I have also described how to take advantage of such Jaguar features as instance pooling, connection caching, and transaction management, so that the reader can understand how to build scalable and reusable components. I have covered topics in enough detail so the developer can quickly get started in building an application. I have also tried to present the material so that the book may be used as a handy reference once the concepts are mastered.
This book assumes that the reader has little previous experience with distributed technologies or Jaguar CTS, and covers these topics in detail. This book, however, is not meant for those new to the PowerBuilder environment or programming in general, since the topics are devoted to covering Jaguar CTS development techniques in detail without spending a lot of time discussing how to use the various PowerBuilder painters, DataWindows, or PowerScript. Some basic PowerBuilder concepts are used to draw parallels to the newer concepts, but in general the assumption is that the reader has experience programming in PowerBuilder.
This book uses some conventions to bring important messages to the reader's attention or hammer home a certain point.
Command line examples, sample output, code listings, and URLs are set in a fixed-pitch font. Filenames, new words, and emphasized words will be italicized.
Any warnings, tips, or notes associated with information being provided in this text will be pulled out and set apart in a Note:, Tip:, or Warning: box. Please pay heed to these pull-outs, as they may contain additional useful information, or warnings about exceptions to normal operations.
In order to get the most out of this book you will need to explore the code samples and write your own applications. To do this you will need to have a copy of the Enterprise Application Studio 3 (EAStudio). To write a database application, you will also need a database server. All the examples are written to work with Sybase Adaptive Server AnyWhere, which ships with EAStudio.
The publisher has made all the code samples seen in this book available on their Web site. The code samples were all written using PowerBuilder 7.0 on a laptop running Windows 95 and tested on Jaguar CTS 3.0 running on the Windows NT 4.0 SP3 operating system. By providing code samples on the Web, two things are achieved. First, this book can be offered to you at a lower cost, since the expenses related to producing a CD are eliminated. Second, any enhancements or bug fixes can be made available to readers immediately by posting the newest code on the Web. To get the code samples just point your browser to the following URL: http://www.manning.com/Barlotta2/index.html.
I have tried very hard to provide you with a comprehensive reference on distributed computing with PowerBuilder and Jaguar CTS, however this book is not perfect. By the time you read this, Sybase will have announced information on the "Catalina" release of Jaguar CTS and PowerBuilder, and maintenance releases should also be available. With that in mind, I welcome any and all suggestions and comments from readers. I am sure that every reader will feel that there are missing topics or points that they wish had been covered in more detail. You may also have a tip or idea that may help other developers. If you do, please let me know. This helps you, because both the publisher and I are made aware of how we may better serve you and provide the answers you are looking for in future books. I can be reached via the Internet at mike.barlotta@aegisconsulting.com or through Manning Publications (www.manning.com). Also be sure to visit my company's Web site (www.aegisconsulting.com or www.jaguarcts.com), where I will post articles and tips on distributed computing, Jaguar CTS, and PowerBuilder.