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LegEasy4DOS Professional is a "pioneer" that showcase the future of DataEase.

No! The future is not retro, and the bit about it that is pioneering is not the fact that you can fun DataEase for DOS applications.

That feature is basically just how it should always have been and a catch-up with our history.

Take a closer look - The entire product is made IN DataEase following up on a "slogan" we had when we sat out to refurbish DataEase.

DataEase need to be made in DataEase!

LegEasy4DOS - How it works?

The interest in LegEasy4DOS has been "overwhelming" since we released it at the end of last week.

A lot of eagerly awaiting Professional clients jumped at it and the feedback was not late to come.

Most of you are overjoyed and excited by this opportunity to run DataEase for DOS in a modern environment, and more than happy to scrap your old XP computers and Novell servers that has kept you up at night with worry - when will it draw its last breath and what will I do then?

However not all feedback is good and some of you have been "disappointed" too.

Some of this disappointment is down to us having problem with our server park after the release due to an unexpected heavy load - don't they always say that - but some of you have been running bench mark tests and compared it to "Native" DfD on Native XP, WIndows 7 x32 etc. and the results has baffled you.

Why is it sometimes much slower and then sometimes much faster than the comparison?

In the article below we will try to explain this and how LegEasy4DOS is designed and how it works.

LegEasy4DOS Professional Release 05.08.16

The response to our Personal version of L4D has been fantastic and it has given us great motivation in the work leading up to the release of our long awaited Professional version of L4D.

We won't spend too much time extrapolating its virtues here but limit ourselves to announcing it's release and showcase its beauty ;-)

Further down the article you will find the FREE FOR ALL Trial Key you can use to get the first "spin" in this brand new interpretation of DataEase (for DOS).

New Support Manager and new Support Products introduced

For a long time we have been focusing on improving our software products, but we have now entered a new phase where we will focus more and more on the entire customer experience.

One issue that has been raised more often than others is the lack of a dedicated support service so this is one of the areas were we will now focus.

Last month we hired Fatma Adel as our new Support Manager. She has now had some time to settle in and are more than eager to start helping you resolve your issues.

LegEasy 4DOS - Update!

We are and should be very happy when an upcoming release of a DataEase product cause this much of a stir, but it is also a sobering moment.

We obviously still have some catching up to do with our new products before they reach the same popularity as the early versions of DataEase.

Luckily the "re-launch" of DataEase for DOS is part of our DataEase infrastructure strategy so you will now be able to run your legacy apps well into this century when at the same time integrate them with the latest DataEase technology.

Locking Strategies for dummies!

Ever wondered why you have so much trouble with inconsistency and being locked out of your DataEase database? If the answer is YES, read one and discover how you can easily remedy it.

Full, Basic, Opportunistic - What does this really mean? We get a lot of questions about which locking to choose in DataEase, and the answers we have give - are giving, have changed over the years. I guess that if this was a simple as it "should be", there wouldn't even be three options in DataEase, and we wouldn't leave this is in your hands.

I have spent quite a lot of times over the years debating and exploring this myself, and the problem is that it is more of a philosophical problem, than a technical one. Pictures this as going into a Chinese restaurant and ordering. You get a many with 500 items, and you are vaguely familiar with 3 of them, so what do you do. Choose what you know, or go for the set menu...

[{8}]five Release and Release program.

Finally...

DataEase {[8}]five went into production today and from now on it will be all about 8.5 and beyond.

We have now concluded the longest Beta program in DataEase history - 427 days or over 1 year and 2 months.

So why so little fanfare on this watershed day?

Warning! Price increase on DataEase 8 from January 1st

We are changing how we license DataEase from Januar 1st 2016.

In short we will stop dividing licenses (and executables) in Developer (Full) and GROUP (Runtime) and introduce a simple User License and one executable that will be either a development environment or a Application Launcher based on the users privileges.

The change might seem dramatic at first, but you will get much more functionality and flexibility.

This is just an early warning to those of you that plan to buy DataEase 8 in the near future, more information on the change in product and licensing strategy will follow.

Dynamic Design - A New paradigm in DataEase development

ExecDQLClass(), CreateTable(), AddColumn()* signify a complete breach with previous DataEase thinking.

From its infancy in the early 80ies and throughout its life until DE8 there was a clear divide in DataEase between Design and Runtime. (At least in the head of the designers, but the fact that most people used it interactively and added and changed to it in real time was not taken into account)

Tables, Scripts, Forms, Reports was froozen in runtime and there was few if any way you could make your application dynamic.

How this has changed in 8....

How to create CDFs for use in DE8/DG3

This is how you create your own CDFs using Visual Studio 2013. I selected to use this version because any one can get a full version for free as long as you register with MicroSoft. You should be able to recreate this in any version of Visual Studio in almost the same way as described here. Not much has changed in creating Windows DLLs in the last 20 years. You probably can do the same using other compilers as MinWin GCC and Embarcadero, but that is outside the scope of this document.

Migrating from DFW 5.x and 6.x to DE8.5 including National Versions

If you want to encompass DataEase problems in one word it must be Migration. It is fascinating that a company that has had so little success with this concept, has sworn to it for such a long time.

It is a badly hidden secret that DataEase lost most of it users in the flawed and bodged migration of DFD application to early DFW, what is maybe not so well know is all the other "unsuccessful" migration events.

In this article we will explain what/why and how it went wrong and what you can do to work around it.

We reached our 1.000.000 visitor today 23rd of February 2015

At the beginning of the year we had estimated that we would get our 1.000.000 visitor at the 6th June this year, but with the Beta of 8.5 and the great feedback we have seen both visits on our website and sales sky-rocket and we reached the 1.000.000 threshold more than a Quarter ahead of schedule!

We just have to thank you all for your patience with us, and for your contributions and support throughout the last couple of years since we took charge.

We both hope and feel that our efforts and enthusiasm for DataEase has been well received and are reciprocated by you all!

A wholehearted thank you to your all from "The DataEase Team".

NEW! Functions in DataEase 8.0 to 8.5 (Page 1)

Some of you might be aware of it but it seems a lot isn't so it might be time to advertise a little the vast number of new functions and functionalities that has been added to DataEase 8.0 through 8.5.

For a long time the only way new functions found their way to DataEase was through active and ingenious users which developed CDF's. As much as the CDF's alleviated the obvious short-comings in DataEase 5.x to 7.2 it was cumbersome, undocumented and "secretive" i.e. not everyone was in the know.

With 8.x we decided that the focus needed to be on moving DataEase forward, rather than the constant dance around the "bug fixing" fire.

Have a look and a try for yourself.

Due to the number of new functions we had to publish the short description in two articles, of which this is the last.

Also have a look on the blog synopsis found in the list to the right.

NEW! ?Functions in DataEase 8.0 to 8.5 (Page 2)

Some of you might be aware of it but it seems a lot isn't so it might be time to advertise a little the vast number of new functions and functionalities that has been added to DataEase 8.0 through 8.5.

For a long time the only way new functions found their way to DataEase was through active and ingenious users which developed CDF's. As much as the CDF's alleviated the obvious short-comings in DataEase 5.x to 7.2 it was cumbersome, undocumented and "secretive" i.e. not everyone was in the know.

With 8.x we decided that the focus needed to be on moving DataEase forward, rather than the constant dance around the "bug fixing" fire.

Have a look and a try for yourself.

Due to the number of new functions we had to publish the short description in two articles, of which this is the first.

Also have a look on the blog synopsis found in the list to the right.

Start your own thread!

20/01/25 15:24:13

Re:Re:What is New in LE9 sample.

DEOS in DEBook

Scroll down to @EmailSend and you will see how the function works.

You will see there is quite a lot of other useful functions in DEOS (DataEase Operating System, which we created in DE9 to include more specialised stuff that shouldn't clog up the function tray in DE).

It will pick up defaults from RDRRAAA.INI if arguments is missing.

The problem is very often picky SMTP servers so you have to get it all correct.

We are working with the new SMTP functionality which will include a test of your settings as well as a AUTO mode where we query the SMTP server to figure out what settings it will need.

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: DataEase

20/01/25 14:57:52

Re:What is New in LE9 sample.

Thanks for including the whats new files I think I'm on the right lines however even the whats new examples assumes the Email Configuration is valid and this is where I think I'm going wrong. Is there a way I can tell if it is valid ? Do you have a date for the new email update mentioned previously ? 

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: Eric

17/01/25 11:18:38

What is New in LE9 sample.

Download What is New LE9


Here is the latest increment of the What is New in LE9.

You can download and use that to test these things.

It is basically just a test of new function sample we create for ourselves when developing so don't look to much at the layout etc ;-)

Developers aren't designers....

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: DataEase

17/01/25 11:15:29

Re:DE9 Email configuration.

Hi Eric.

We are amending the email function as so many SMTP servers now demand a more secure authentication due to spam etc. SMTP is a fire and forget protocol which is a big problem as people can actually very easily use any server to forward their spam.

Another problem is that based on the header forwarded by your email/smtp your emails might get caught in the spam filter of the recipient. 

I had that problem testing it myself as "test" etc. from the same sender obviously was "suspicious" ;-)

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: DataEase

13/01/25 15:18:43

DE9 Email configuration.

Hi, I'm trying to email pdf documents directly from Dataease. I have set the email configuration to a yahoo account I created for the purpose. I have an icon with a blue spinning gear which I assume means something (hopefully good).  I was hoping to use DocumentRun to do the work and have got the pdf creation working but the email doesn't seem to work, and the system gives no clues as to what is going wrong. Can anyone point me in the right direction.      

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: Eric

08/01/25 13:21:09

DIW create utility

Attached is an example app containing a generic utility to automatically create a DIW script and copy all required files to a folder.

This is useful for where one or more users are working on one or more DEV app copies to be able to easily select and export new and updated documents for import into the production app.

It can be installed in any LE9 app as long as there are no form/table/relationship name conflicts.


The utility can be used to select docs created/modified for export as a new or updated document and table data can be included.

This was originally created many years ago in DFW 5 and is now updated for LE9.
Username: USER
Password: USER

NB: Doc & Records status must be run before REFRESH EXPORT EDITOR
>>AUTO SELECT DOCS 
allows for new/modified docs for a specified date range and user name to be automatically selected with appropriate selection of DIW 'install'/'replace' option based on the document change control history.
NB: This utility will not work for docs created/ modified if logging in with the default blank username. A non-blank high level user name must be used.

To install this utility in a LE9 app:
1. Copy the  \XDOCS subfolder to your application folder - eg. ..\YOURAPP\XDOCS
2. Copy the Wizutil132ns.dll cdf library to you program or app folder.
3. Import Wiz_CDFS.txt into Custom Functions - NB: Tab delimited - (required for progress bar function - many thanks to Lawrence Fox)
4. Import RelsX.txt into Relationships - NB: Tab delimited- Use "add only new records" to ensure it does not overwrite existing records
5. Run the Install_xDocs.diw  DIW script (the docs file path is relative with the expectation that XDOCS is a subfolder in your app folder)
    The script will not overwrite any existing docs with the same name.

Not sure if DIW scripts will still be supported in DE9, but if not hopefully there will be a newer method to easily export / import new & updated docs/tables.

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: Sam

06/01/25 13:28:13

Re:Re:help please

ok. thx a lot and best wishes for all and Glory Slava to DataEase team! <3

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: Ihor Zakharchenko

06/01/25 12:55:15

Re:help please

its been fixed. Maybe not put license keys like this on an open forum...

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: DataEase

02/01/25 19:32:11

Searching for a job opportunity

Hello, my name is George and I have been authorized directly by Ulrik Jacob Hoegh-Krohn to post this thread on the forum.

I'm very experienced when it comes to developing in DataEase; I started working with the application since March 2013 when my former employer introduced me to it. Back then we were using the 7.2 version and in short time I learned to do everything that the application offers: building forms by adding fields, labels and buttons, writing the script of procedures, writing derivations and validation formulas into the fields, creating relationships between tables, etc.

After 5 years of working in an office in Italy, my former employer decided to retire so I got hired directly by a reinsurance company in Netherlands and started to work remotely from home. My tasks were pretty much the same but as time went by I had to do new things such as writing records in Oracle Coda and SQL Server through an ODBC connection and by this time I was using the 8.5 version. I worked directly for this company until September 2023 when they decided to drop DataEase and pursue a new web application. Since then I practiced on using DataEase 9 and LegEasy 9 in minor projects.

Given my experience with DataEase I'm currently looking for a company that still focuses on the use and development of this program. If there's a suitable position I would be delighted to apply for a job. For more information you can contact me at this email address: jiglaugeorge@yahoo.it

Thank you for your time and consideration.

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Product: Dataease 9 Developer

Written by: George Cristian Jiglau

16/12/24 22:48:08

LE9 .6835 Change in DQL editor type-ahead search and Tab behaviour?

In LE9 .6835 in DQL editor pick list the type-ahead context search will only find the first character.

In previous versions in the DQL editor Tables pick list a table named "ABCDE" can be found by typing 'abc' .

Now the auto-search is limited to the first character. The Table matching the first typed letter will be found.

i.e. typing 'abc' will find the first table starting with a, followed by the first table starting with 'b' and then the first table starting with 'c'.

Same applies to other pick lists.

Tab in the DQL editor window is also different.

Previously Tab would be equivalent to 14 characters indent and it is a tab space

Now it is not a Tab space - it adds 2 blank characters.

Is this hard coded or an .ini setting?

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: Sam

25/11/24 05:39:17

Re:Re:Understand index and virtual field use in DataEase

ps. 1990s practice with field indexes was described in volume 2 of de 4.* manual devoted to dba & applications development. limitations were up to 8 indexed fields on a single form. only necessary fields were to be inedexed. new recommendations here are close to truth. the truth is in that no indexes at all. indexing makes database application slow and memory & disk storage consumption are huge. for sure in some cases indexing helps nevertheless. 

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Product: Dataease 9 Developer

Written by: Ihor Zakharchenko

22/11/24 20:13:06

Re:Re:Re:Re:DE8.5 Textout UTF-8 format

Hi, Sam! Very useful case! Thx. May be A and B are different a bit ? What about text format of C which is the combination of A and B ? Thank You.

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Product: DataEase 8.5 Runtime

Written by: Ihor Zakharchenko

22/11/24 15:01:16

Re:Re:Re:DE8.5 Textout UTF-8 format

As noted in the initial post the server system locale settings were checked and nothing has changed.

User logon is via Published Remote App with Active directory credentials.

The system locale settings for the user session are set according to the server system locale.

What is weirder is that for the same user logon two different processes yield different results.

User logs in and runs procedure A and gets an ANSI file.

In the same session procedure B delivers a UTF-8 file.

Both text files are created with a DQL using textout / textoutln

I agree it's definitely due to some issue on the server. Unfortunately that just makes it more complicated as the server is a VM managed by a third party and they seldom volunteer any information of any changes.

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Product: DataEase 8.5 Runtime

Written by: Sam

22/11/24 12:23:04

Re:Re:DE8.5 Textout UTF-8 format



This is 100% a windows problem.

Is this app running on the server or on a client?

If it is not running on the server, the server is not the culprit. This problem is on the Windows where the app is running.


The character set you are looking into here was created to handle Greek/SImplified Chineese etc. and to be honest it has hardly ever been used. It It exploit the fact that you can set up a different 8 bit character set in windows but it just complicate things if you don't really need it.

Most likely the problem is that someone has played with the system local.

This is a bleeding mess if you get dragged into it. Our approach and recommendation is that one should never play with server settings or things like this as it is more likely to cause problems than fix them.

Our goal is to deliver software that run on default software/hardware without any of this wizardry needed or recommended.

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Product: DataEase 8.5 Runtime

Written by: DataEase

22/11/24 04:36:56

Re:DE8.5 Textout UTF-8 format

From 7.2.2 help
RDRRDAAA.INI 

ANSI_CHARSET

ApplicationCharset= 0
DEFAULT_CHARSET
ApplicationCharset=1

Default for DE8.5 is ApplicationCharset= 0

Changing setting to ApplicationCharset=1 does not make a difference to text file output - still ANSI 

Not sure if this setting is relevant for text file output?

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Product: DataEase 8.5 Runtime

Written by: Sam

22/11/24 03:57:40

DE8.5 Textout UTF-8 format

We have a DE85 app that writes text files using textout / textoutln on a MS2012 server.

Up until 2024-10-30 the files created were UTF-8 format.
For some unknown reason as from 2024-10-31 the files are ANSI format.
Nothing was changed on the DE85 app
According to server hosting support no changes to Server or AD system locale changes were made (and none can be seen)

If the ANSI format files created are opened in Notepad and edited and saved then the format is UTF-8 so there does not appear to be anything changed in the server default for text file format.

Is there any way to force DE8.5 Textout to UTF-8 format?



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Product: DataEase 8.5 Runtime

Written by: Sam

19/11/24 23:49:19

Re:Re:LE9 copy special FIXED

Thank you

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Product: LegEasy 9 Developer

Written by: Sam

18/11/24 15:10:04

Re:Understand index and virtual field use in DataEase

thx. that was tested with dfd even in 1990s ... 

 blackouts due to the war impose low power consumption & high productivity of software here in Ukraine now...

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Product: Dataease 9 Developer

Written by: Ihor Zakharchenko

17/11/24 15:08:11

Understand index and virtual field use in DataEase

Indexes is mostly "abused" in DataEase. People think the more the better, but they will only work if used right.

As a general rule indexes will make searching faster and saving slower. 

But...

DataEase will only use an index on searching sorting if the first field in the search is indexed and only on the first field. There is no combined indexes so column two onwards in any search will be sequential. That is fine if the first column will narrow it down substantially. However if one have 3 million records and put the index on a yes/no field where half is yes and half is no, you will get a return cursor of 1.5 million that will be search manually for ex. date=current date.

So obviously if one search for current date first and then yes/no you get a much better cursor.

If you sort in reverse on an index field it will do a sequential search again as the index is chronological and it can't be used in reverse.

When analyzing "troubled" DataEase applications where the developer/user say "it worked before" (yes it di when they had 50k records and not 5 million) the problem is very often that they over-index and don't use the indexes at all. I've seen tables with 250 fields and 70 indexes that "used to work". Maybe they shouldn't have.

When you look at the files some of the index files are bigger than the data file...

So obviously when 70+ indexes is to be updated and maintained every time  you save a record it will be slow...and meaningless as they indexes is not used anyway.

We frequently get "complaints" about the limit of 255 fields in a table, but to be honest. If one think having 255 fields in a table is optimum one should revise ones viewpoint and look up data-modelling on the internet. There might be something to learn.

So in general.

1. Only index fields that you know you will use the index on.
2. Keep the number of columns in a table at a minimum and the index fields the same.
3. Don't put virtual fields in tables and avoid to reference virtual fields from other tables. Calculate them when you need them where you need them. In Forms you can simply create virtual fields as part of the form rather than as part of the table. A good rule is never to use the form that defines table other than for defining the saved columns, then all virtual fields in forms will be a property of the form. 
4. In DQL you should never reference a virtual field but simply recreate it in the DQL as a temp variable.

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Product: Dataease 9 Developer

Written by: DataEase

14/11/24 12:56:43

Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Virtual server configuration

das ist fantastisch! what about of reindexing time in the case then ? for sure, DataEase isn't a simple mechanism and the golden rule of mechanics is not about of 7000000 records with amount of fields more than 1... thx  a lot for the this amazing case!

VMware is excellent with LE9 on a new Apple processors ...non Intel for sure

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Product: DataEase 8.5 Runtime

Written by: Ihor Zakharchenko

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