West Wind Web Connection Chat, Feb 1st, 2007

Rick Strahl says:

Ok, let's get started...

Rick Strahl says:

The focus of this chat is kind of an open forum, so I'm not going to do a general monologue here, but will go straight to asking what's on your mind.

Rick Strahl says:

Anybody have any questions, comments, suggestions? A belly ache? And the weather don't count <g>

Mark Beno says:

Well, I'll start.....I've been trying to find time to really get into 5.0 (believe it or not) and I was thinking that if you had a full-fledged set of videos, I'd be willing to pay for it.

Shaun Kester says:

I second what Mark is saying. I haven't made the jump either.

Marty Cantwell says:

Me too.

Rick Strahl says:

Yes this is something on my list.

Mark Beno says:

Oh...I've hit on something. I'm not sure what the market would be....but I'd be willing to pay >$250 for a decent set...and you're a pretty good teacher.

Rick Strahl says:

Actually what I really want to do first is do online training using Goto Meeting.

Marty Cantwell says:

That would be the next best thing to a Double Impact event IMHO.

Rick Strahl says:

Unforutnately I've been extremely busy and haven't gotten around to preparing materials for training. Setting up for training for WC 5.0 would involve a bit more work, but the time is coming when this really needs to be done.

Stein Goering says:

If that happens I'd definitely be interested.

Rick Strahl says:

Yes I'm not opposed to 'live' training in person either, but with the Fox conferences having pretty much disappeared except for Southwest Fox that's kinda difficult to do.

Rick Strahl says:

What are you thoughts on online training?

Ian G. Lloyd says:

Does GoTo Meeting allow you to record... clause it would be good to download them if you missed one... similar to the VMP seseeions Drew Speedie had from VisionPace... they are still available for download and a good place to start a newbie...

Rick Strahl says:

ie. GotoMeeting

Marty Cantwell says:

Talley me in...

Mark Beno says:

Yes, sounds good to me.

Rick Strahl says:

Yes, although I've heard there are problems with the recorder not always working reliably and mangling the captures.

Shaun Kester says:

me too

Rick Strahl says:

Preferrable over physical training?

Ian G. Lloyd says:

sorry... I though that was what the online stuff was called

Rick Strahl says:

Ok that's good feedback actually. I'd been putting this off mainly because I wasn't sure whether there would be any interest. But it seems there's even interest in the more hardcore group of WC folks so that's a good sign.

Marty Cantwell says:

That's a tough one Rick. You are a dynamic, fun, and easy to follow instructor in person. THAT is always a big plus!

Shaun Kester says:

I'd much rather it be in person, but gotomeeting is better then nothing.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

boy... is it hard to type and read at the same time... I always loose my place <s>

Rick Strahl says:

Well the problem with live training is that it's really tough to get enough people to make ti worthwhile. I need about 20 people to break even on these things.

Randy Pearson says:

In person plus video taping, so we don't all forget by the time we return home. But that would be a big hassle.

Marty Cantwell says:

Very important point these days. As is the added cost for attendees to travel to a live event not associated with another convention...

Rick Strahl says:

Well, at the moment the delay on my part is lack of prepared material. But if there's enough interest as it seems there is, then this is much more likely to happen.

Frank De Baere says:

The videos Rick provides us with are pretty decent already. The real and only learning process is diging into the code and samples ...

Rick Strahl says:

Yeah, and standalone training for just 1 day would be really not practical - it'd have to be for 2 or 3 days.

Rick Strahl says:

Not that I can't fill that <s>

Marty Cantwell says:

But, two days of live training with you is like four with most others...<g>

Rick Strahl says:

So anybody using the 5.0 features?

Shaun Kester says:

I guess I find it tough (to go to v5) because I primarily work with the web and the lines between web/programming are bluring more each day.

Randy Pearson says:

Not yet.

Rick Strahl says:

Playing with them?

Marty Cantwell says:

Not yet beyond playing with them.

Rick Strahl says:

Shaun - what do you mean by that?

Shaun Kester says:

The integration with Visual Studio is new to me. It seems like the line between windows programming and web dev is more blurred.

Stein Goering says:

It seems like 5.0 is intended for those of us who have to deal with those blurred lines

Rick Strahl says:

Well, yes and no.

Rick Strahl says:

It's still clearly Web programming. But it's control based.

Rick Strahl says:

So it's a lot easier (IMHO) to assign and manage page layout and talk to content of the page.

Rick Strahl says:

You get much more benefit from reusable functionality out of the Web Control Framework.

Marty Cantwell says:

So it is to Web programming what OOP was to C?

Rick Strahl says:

But it's still a pure Web model and I'm not sure if thinking about it as a desktop 'metaphor' is the right way to go about it.

Marty Cantwell says:

Ah

Shaun Kester says:

Don't get me wrong, I love WC. I guess I'm just starting to realize that I use it for simply connecting to VFP data. I use javascript frameworks like jQuery for all of my ajax, dhtml, and styling.

Shaun Kester says:

I've never created a VFP form in my life.

Rick Strahl says:

Yes in a way I guess. It just makes most of the content on the page objects that you can talk to. Rather than a bunch of Response.Write() code you have a page objects, literal text (the stuff you create in the designer around controls) and controls on the page that each can be referenced and accessed via code or markup.

Shaun Kester says:

<s>

Rick Strahl says:

Shaun nothing wrong with that.

Shaun Kester says:

I want to learn that, and that is why 5.0 is so interesting. Response.Write is a good 80% of my code.

Rick Strahl says:

The Web Control Framework is optional obviously, and the core WWWC engine is going to continue to work the way it always has <s>.

Shaun Kester says:

Good points. Thanks.

Rick Strahl says:

If you're mostly doing Ajax like stuff anyway though I suspect that you might not gain as much of WWWC because the AJAX stuff kind of breaks the direct UI client to server connection and makes the server more of a data service.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

yes... that's the beauty of VFP and WC...

Marty Cantwell says:

You've been using the newest server platform for a while now, haven't you Rick? Have you run into any OS "path enforcement" issues with installing or operating your WC apps?

Rick Strahl says:

I mean the flexibility that is in WWWC is always going to be there, but I do spent most of my time today in updating the Web Controls because ultimately I think that's where I can truly create cool features that people will want to use.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

yes I have taken a keen interest in the webcontrols...

Rick Strahl says:

Marty - no not really. Mainly because Web Connection doesn't install in Program Files, so it's actually not affected by this, but you do need to make sure you set up appropriate rights for your install directories.

Stein Goering says:

Having the core WWWC engine there is nice - I was able to move my legacy app (which I've been working on since 1998 so it's about as legacy as you can get) to 5.0 and retain existing functionality - but I've been able to the new style pages as I add new features.

Rick Strahl says:

Yes I think the Web Controls are really where it's at because it not only allows me to build useful controls, but you all as well <s>. IOW you can extend Web Connection with resuable functinoality.

Marty Cantwell says:

I see. I'm attempting to get a desktop app 'Vista' ready and it's somewhat of a pain...

Shaun Kester says:

@Stein: good to know. I need to do that soon.

Rick Strahl says:

Marty - what do you mean? Before installing even?

Rick Strahl says:

Ian - just dabbling or working with it?

Marty Cantwell says:

Well, in trying to avoid running in XP compatability mode (non-VFP app).

Ian G. Lloyd says:

I have extended WC similar to Randy, but again completely from the ground up and have decide to use the WC webContols as my base class for Form controls...

Rick Strahl says:

Ok.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

I have a piece that I have in development but will switch to production via a pagefactory when its all work thru..

Rick Strahl says:

I suspect there's lots of overlap between L7 and what WWWC Web Controls do.

Rick Strahl says:

Which is why Randy and Co. aren't using Web Controls <gd&rfR>

Ian G. Lloyd says:

I am not actually using L7... I worked up my own after studing L7, Voodoo and your new V5.0

Rick Strahl says:

Yeah only suggestion I have for you is if you can try to stay with the Web Control framework model so that you can take advantage of new controls etc as they become available.

Randy Pearson says:

Yeah pretty much so. Maybe when I get my Vista machine to play on, I'll also play with 5.0 + L7 integration.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

I use several of your classes as base classes and am working with the webcontrols in a similar manner...

Rick Strahl says:

A good example of this are the new AJAX controls that have been added recently. Heck I had no idea I was going to create some of those when I started buillding WWWC <s>

Mark Beno says:

Us neither....but they're sure cool! <g>

Frank De Baere says:

I like the webcontrol framework mainly for it's extensibility and it's similarity to ASP NET. You can create complex web app's (AJAX power) with few (and simple) fox code.

Rick Strahl says:

Frank - yes, that's pretty much the idea. I think it works that way too and its not just an empty promise <s>.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

unfortuantely most of the Ajax is mute for me as I don't/can't use Javascript on the handhelds

Rick Strahl says:

But at the same time there's a bit of culture shock to overcome because it is very different from traditional WWWC applications.

Randy Pearson says:

Rick, I agree. We have some controls that I had no plans to create, but then wanted to avoid doing the same think more than once. Suddenly before you know it, they've been reused hundreds of times, and you cannot do without them.

Marty Cantwell says:

I think that for me, I'm just a late adopter of even great things like WWWC5 controls. After all, I was still writing dBase and Assembly code for CP/M in the mid 80s'. But this conversation is forcing me to do another paradigm shift...

Shaun Kester says:

Ian - I think that will be getting better as more true browsers become embedded in handhelds i.e. phones, pdas, etc.

Rick Strahl says:

Great <s>. Maybe we should have these chats more frequently.

Rick Strahl says:

The WCF is kind of a strange beast too when you think about it.

Randy Pearson says:

Waiting to see what the new Apple iPhone uses for browsing, ie. what CSS model etc.

Marty Cantwell says:

<Turning around so Rick can deliver good swift kick>

Ian G. Lloyd says:

yes... but we recently worked on some windows ce devices that had all sorts of issues with HTML and Javascript still

Shaun Kester says:

My paradigm shift has to go from being a web developer to an IDE typically associated with Windows.

Rick Strahl says:

It's easier to use in some ways - the designer and layout functionality and code generation. But also more complex in terms of how many things you can do with individual controls. Lots of properties, methods, events etc. and that can be potentially off-putting when getting started.

Randy Pearson says:

[Aside: I like this chat applet better than previous ones.]

Rick Strahl says:

Shaun - FWIW, Visual Studio is not required for using the Web Controls. If you're good with working in HTML you can manually insert control definitions in any HTML editing environment.

Rick Strahl says:

You lose some of the discovery though: Intellisense and the Property Sheet, which IMHO is the big draw of the WCF. That's what really makes it much easier.

Marty Cantwell says:

Randy - It seems as smooth and any other I've used...

Frank De Baere says:

Yes but's it's a real nice excuse to start using it ...

Shaun Kester says:

...and that's why we need a BBQ at your place for 3 days of getting in to v5 <bg>

Lauren Clarke says:

Yeah, Rick has it right. The primary reason I've not done much with WWWC5 is that there is a great deal of overlap between it and L7. It's not the same, and there are some very cool things I wish L7 did, but the delta is small enough to not be able to overcome the inertia.

Rick Strahl says:

Randy - yes. I've worked out some of the kinks. <s>

Stein Goering says:

Actually Randy, that's not an aside given that the chat app is built with WCF controls

Rick Strahl says:

Looks like it works pretty well. We got close to 15 people on and it looks like no lost messages.

Lauren Clarke says:

yes it (the chat) is quite smooth. One ER. Don't have it auto-scroll to the bottom when a new message arrives (alert in some other way).

Marty Cantwell says:

I've been lost for years, but that's a different problem!

Rick Strahl says:

The WWWC server is cranking pretty hard though <s>. I got TS open here looking at the request go by and it's running about 5 requests a seond (along with the rest of the site).

Rick Strahl says:

Lauren. What would you do for that if not scroll?

Randy Pearson says:

I like the icon color changes: encourages participation.

Rick Strahl says:

Yes that's the idea. You can see the slackers immediately <g>

Lauren Clarke says:

some sort of client-side "new content" indicator like a little churning giff or something.

Mark Beno says:

Oh...sorry.

Randy Pearson says:

Maybe a [x] lock scrolling checkbox, so you can unlock and go back and read what's above

Rick Strahl says:

Yeah but you still have to display the content <s>

Lauren Clarke says:

as it is, it's pretty much impossible to catch up if you were...er... distracted during the chat

Marty Cantwell says:

How about an audio "bling" and/or a flash of one element or other on the client side Rick?

Rick Strahl says:

If I remember right any chat client pretty much scrolls like this.

Keith Hackett says:

Messenger doesn't but I wish it would.

Darrell Gardner says:

Sorry ... Late.

Mark Beno says:

I like the checkbox idea....stop new content so you can go back and read (in case you were drawn away), then uncheck and refresh.

Rick Strahl says:

Or do you mean just an indicator? That's easy enough.

Randy Pearson says:

IM clients seem to scroll when the thumb control is at bottom, but not if you've manually scrolled back up.

Lauren Clarke says:

Rick: it's a control issue. The scrollbar in MSN Chat (for instance) realizes that you were scrolled up and places you back there (if you have the mouse-down maybe)

Randy Pearson says:

Part of the frustration would be mitigated if this box could be resized too.

Rick Strahl says:

OH now I see what you mean! <ding>

Lauren Clarke says:

Randy. Right.

Rick Strahl says:

Yeah, but you know how hard downward sizing is <g>

Rick Strahl says:

Horizontal sizing no problem. vertical sizing sucks across browsers.

Darrell Gardner says:

so is the call back hitting the server for content updates only?

Rick Strahl says:

Yes

Rick Strahl says:

Well, it's polling every 5 seconds.

Mark Beno says:

How about this...control button next to send that says "Freeze feed"...when pressed, you receive no new content and button changes to "Restart feed"...then when you're caught up you can press that.

Darrell Gardner says:

ok. so you are seeing, x #participatnts times 5 for hits on the server.

Rick Strahl says:

Mark - yes that sounds about right.

Darrell Gardner says:

5 seconds that is

Randy Pearson says:

Do late arrivers have a way to see the portion of th echat they missed?

Lauren Clarke says:

mark's idea has the side advantage of reducing server load as well...

Rick Strahl says:

something like that yes. There are a few additional interspersed to update the Active User list and activity management.

Rick Strahl says:

Well, few will turn that on I bet other than when catching up.

Rick Strahl says:

Ok... enought about the chat <s>.

Rick Strahl says:

Any other thoughts questions, comments? Problems etc.?

Lauren Clarke says:

you could auto-enable it when their icon turns orange... <s>

Randy Pearson says:

LOL

Rick Strahl says:

Well I can just not move the scrollbar to the bottom when it's not already on the bottom.

Darrell Gardner says:

I think not moving the scroll bar, but activating some light that indicates new messages.

Randy Pearson says:

Eeek! I just got distracted and clicked the little button below and lost all the previous Chat.

Rick Strahl says:

Yes those buttons do a full post back. You're probably want to not have those on a chat normally <s>

Darrell Gardner says:

Hey Stein, errrr. Test. <smirk>

Mark Beno says:

I guess my only other question is would someone do my job while I take 2 months off to really learn WC5? <g>

Darrell Gardner says:

It would be cool to be able to cancel a message if you can before the 5second post.

Greg Dohm says:

Have there been any questions about .NET controls and potential of integrating them with WCF controls?

Darrell Gardner says:

a "Doh" button.

Rick Strahl says:

No not yet <s>

Marty Cantwell says:

Greg: Sounds like there just was!

Rick Strahl says:

You mean taking standard ASP.NET controls and running them in Web Connection?

Stein Goering says:

I'm here. Just taking in all this wisdom..

Greg Dohm says:

I guess...or as other 3rd party .net controls

Greg Dohm says:

Like infralogics?sp.

Rick Strahl says:

Web Connection doesn't actually run any of the .NET controls. It runs only VFP code so the controls that WWWC supports are controls that are created in Fox code. So, no you can't use arbitrary .NET controls.

Rick Strahl says:

There's no way that Web Connection could run those types of controls since these controls do all of hteir work in .nET.

Greg Dohm says:

I see...but is'nt there some planned way to run .net code (so a .net control) behind the scenes in .net and then catch the output and redirect thru fox?

Rick Strahl says:

If you want to use controls like that you have to - use .NET <s>

Rick Strahl says:

Or ASP.NET with COM

Marty Cantwell says:

Randy: You'd want to disable the browser Back button too! (Just hit it accidentally)

Darrell Gardner says:

If you hit the chat ID and just close thewindow then you lose conversation. <frown>

Greg Dohm says:

Fair enough...thought I would ask!

Shaun Kester says:

It's probably bad form, but that I why I put my users in a chromeless window for my wc apps.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

Rick... it appears as if you consider do WebServices in VFP a poor appraoch... u suggest using .NET and then calling out to Fox via interlop... right?

Rick Strahl says:

For complex Web Services - yes.

Rick Strahl says:

Or for non-Fox -> Fox Web Services.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

bu complex... you mean the data that is transported...

Rick Strahl says:

Yes. Complex types, arrays, enums etc. Not just strings and numbers.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

and why is it the non-fox should be done in .Net?

Rick Strahl says:

We've been through the headache with that <g>

Darrell Gardner says:

I've gotta run. If anything Hosting / server setup Related comes up. Let me know. Rick will you be posting a transcript?

Rick Strahl says:

Possibly. If I don't hit the back button first <g>

Marty Cantwell says:

That's OK Rick. I've already done that for you...<g>

Rick Strahl says:

If you're interfacing with non-Fox services, the Fox tools usually don't do well reading the WSDL. I was thinking more of the client end not the server end.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

fair enough... I have just started to do more Web Services and I am trying to get my head around the best approach for our purposes...

Marty Cantwell says:

Has anyone worked on doing any secure web services with WWWC? By secure I mean different authentication methods for fee-based services.

Greg Dohm says:

Was wondering how you set font size on a WWF button...style seems to be the only parameter available set...so does this 'style' refer to a userdefined CSS section heading?

Rick Strahl says:

Well, as you know the SOAP Toolkit is very limited. wwSOAP works better in some situations, but not that many either - it's just that Web Service protocols have gotten so complex it's become impossible to keep up with for me. Managing this in VFP is not really feasible any longer.

Rick Strahl says:

Greg - yes.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

so is it fair to say the the wwSoap class will not really be enhanced or receive much further attention on your part...

Rick Strahl says:

I didn't want to add a bunch of duplicating properties to keep the size of the controls and parsing down.

Rick Strahl says:

Ian - it likely won't be enhanced much, but certainly I'll try to keep it as up to date as possible and fix issues. But for the most part - yes. I'm not planning on implement WS-* protocols or any other SOAP 2.0 features.

Rick Strahl says:

Greg - styles will let you accomplish all of that and more.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

ok... thanx...

Greg Dohm says:

Does use of the login control have any performance hit on high volume applications?

Rick Strahl says:

There's been more focus on using CSS properties in the controls anyway so CSS is one thing that is probably useful to get up to speed on.

Rick Strahl says:

No. It doesn't do anything unless you're logging in <s>.

Randy Pearson says:

For our controls and page elements, we've removed all old formatting properties, and use only CSSClass and CSSStyle properties now.

Greg Dohm says:

Does'nt reset the session timestamp each time...to prevent a timeout?

Rick Strahl says:

Well you'll take a session hit, yes. But if you're using session anyway there's nothing additional other than a single lookup to verify. I don't think it's anything to worry about in terms of performance.

Randy Pearson says:

Any app with session tracking does that, whether login or not.

Marty Cantwell says:

I've been working to do the same to my older apps too Randy. It's not been as hard as I thought it would be...

Rick Strahl says:

Yes CSS is defintiely the way to go. The Web Controls use CSS for all layout properties, so you get that much at least for free.

Shaun Kester says:

I've gotta say the performance with WC is great, my old P3 can take tons of hits, but I've never been able to get session tracking to work properly.

Rick Strahl says:

Another side effect of using the controls <s>

Greg Dohm says:

I understand Button_click() 's followed with a redirect to a next page losing form variables...where's HLINK save formvars...are Button_click()'s generally better to use over HLINK's?

Stein Goering says:

Re CSS: I subclassed wwShowcursor to use class tags - solved a lot of user complaints about look and feel..

Rick Strahl says:

Greg - not sure what you mean. Any WWWC event does a postback to the server and shouldn't lose any variables.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

HLINKS or PostBack... depends on what you want to accomplish

Ian G. Lloyd says:

if you need the data sent back to the server a POST is required... if you want to ove to a new page you can use a HLINK

Greg Dohm says:

Oh, maybe what I have done wrong, is used redirect(Nextpage.wscx) which loses the form variables. I have done this in the button_click() after processing...to navigate to the next page.

Rick Strahl says:

A redirect always loses form variables. But if you're doing the redirect in a button click you get the form variables in the Button Click event first. You'd have to save the variables or update your data before you do the redirect. This is no different than using a GET HRef link at that point.

Shaun Kester says:

pmfji, I gotta run. Thanks everyone and have a great day!

Mark Beno says:

Sorry guys...keep getting dragged away here. Keep up the great work and take care all.

Marty Cantwell says:

I'm afraid I've got to go too. Thanks much Rick! I am definately leaving with a new determination to try the controls on my rework of an older WC app!
Hope everyone has a great day...

Rick Strahl says:

Ok... any other questions guys? We're starting to lose folks outta here...

Shaun Kester says:

I agree with Marty, I need to get on the v5 bandwagon. Thanks for your time Rick.

Rick Strahl says:

So should we have these sort of chats more regularily like say once a month?

Stein Goering says:

Rick, you mentioned you were reworking some of the controls particularly re AJAX - and they would be in the next release of WC - when can we expect to see that?

Mark Beno says:

I'd show up....helps to get me kick-started into using new things......

Greg Dohm says:

Agreed...time for lunch. Thanks Rick...I continue to be amazed at what a good tool the webconnection controls are. Bye for now.

Randy Pearson says:

This was good. Yeah, maybe with a 75 minute time slot. And get others to help by setting a topic and encouraging participation.

Rick Strahl says:

I'm finishing up that release now. I'm hoping to finish this up over the weekend.

Ian G. Lloyd says:

Rick... the chats are ok as it goes... but what about a webinair where we can see some actual code...

Rick Strahl says:

Yes that'll happen once I get a little better organized <s>. You missed the beginning of the chat? <s>

Randy Pearson says:

I haven't seen another developer in over 6 months, not counting Lauren, so a rendevouz sometime at a conference would be cool.

Greg Dohm says:

Oh yeah. Also is it possible to get a sample page which does a 1 to many demo...using your biz objects?

Ian G. Lloyd says:

no I saw that... just didn't know what the result was...

Rick Strahl says:

If there's enough interest to get a least 20 people together I'm more than happy to put something on.

Rick Strahl says:

But it's a matter of location usually and timing. For conferences there are just not enough things to piggy back to. Really the only thing left is Southwest Fox.

Rick Strahl says:

But if there's enough interest (and from teh sounds of it there is) I suspect I could set something up comlpetely separate and still have people show up.

Rick Strahl says:

Question is where.

Mike Roof says:

Rick, I missed most of this session, is there any type of copy that I could download and read?

Rick Strahl says:

I'm leaning towards west coast like LA or San Diego or something like that.

Greg Dohm says:

Your place in Hawaii!

Rick Strahl says:

Mike I'll post a transscript.