Subject: Old PowerBuilder Facebook page deactivatedHi Everyone, Happy new year! As of today, the old PowerBuilder facebook page is deactivated. Please be sure to become a fan of PowerBuilder here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/PowerBuilder/160355699256 Go PB!!PowerBuilder Fan Page
Tag Archive: Powerbuilder
The following is MY perception of Sybase’s PowerBuilder:
Years ago PowerBuilder was king. No one could touch it. It was relatively inexpensive. Microsoft’s Visual Basic matured and the Pascal based Borland’s Delphi was released. Then it fell and fall it did.
Sybase
As it was falling from the throne Sybase purchased Powersoft, makers of PowerBuilder. As the the market share continued to shrink, PowerBuilder developers had more difficulty in finding new projects. Most new development was written in Visual Basic or Java.
Years went by with marketing of PowerBuilder little more than the occasional road show, TechWave presentations and the ISUG Technical Journal ads catered towards existing customers. Little to no effort was put forth by Sybase to gain new PowerBuilder customers.
During this week’s Sybase TechWave, PowerBuilder version 12 was released. It has all the whistles and kitchen sinks you could ask for. An amazing tool for development! Too bad no one outside of the die hard PowerBuilder programmers will use it.
Blasphemy! Heretic!
Consider this:
Sybase owns PowerBuilder. It owns the PowerBuilder software, PowerBuilder language, PowerScript, the PowerBuilder vm, and everything PowerBuilder.
No problem right?
What will happen to PowerBuilder when Sybase is bought out by another company? Products with tiny market share like PowerBuilder would likely be killed or in a state of limbo for several years. Anyone remember what happened when IBM bought Informix?
Do you really want to bet your career and business on a software development tool that is locked to a single smallish vendor?
Maybe, perhaps, if Sybase were to release the PowerBuilder 4GL language and PowerScript to the world like Microsoft did with the C# and Visual Basic languages and Sun with Java… Perhaps if Sybase would allow 3rd parties to develop tools based around the PowerBuilder language royalty free…
Sybase: PLEASE FREE THE POWERBUILDER 4GL LANGUAGE!
I mean, really, what benefit could Sybase have to cripple the PowerBuilder developers?
What I would love to see is native support for SQLite. http://www.sqlite.org
It is the most installed embedded database on the planet hands down. Don’t believe me? You know that Firefox web browser, Thunderbird newsreader, most Adobe products, Miro, etc all have it embedded? – reference http://www.sqlite.org/mostdeployed.html
We use it extensively at work as:
- staging for mass data imports/exports/conversions
- local application ‘cache’ for large data sets
- projects that don’t require all the features of Sybase ASE (or Oracle for that matter)
One of the best features is that the database itself in platform independent… copy the db on to AIX from your Windows box … then on to your old Amiga … then on to your windows mobile device. Getting the point? 
I really wish Sybase would make it so that the Sybase ASE databases were truly platform and character set/sort order independent… but that is in another dream 
Not a blurb in the PowerDesigner/PowerBuilder manuals or anything
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From our friends at ISUG:
ISUG North American PowerBuilder Tour – Q1, 2008
Additional Dates by Popular Demand!
Sponsored by: Appeon, Enable, Novalys, Sybase
Following on from our successful multi-city tour in 2007, ISUG is pleased to announce additional dates for the PowerBuilder 11 Tour!
- Feb 26th: San Jose, CA – Embassy Suites, Santa Clara
- Feb 27th: Los Angeles, CA – Embassy Suites North, LAX
- Feb 28th: San Diego, CA – Windmill Banquet & Catering, Carlsbad
During these events you will:
- Consume .NET Resources using PowerBuilder 11′s . NET Interoperability
- Create .NET Resources from existing PowerBuilder NVOs
- .NET assemblies
- .NET Web Services
- Use PowerBuilder 11 and ASP.NET 2.0 to create Web Form Applications
- Build WinForm & Smart Client Applications right from within PowerBuilder.
- Set up SQL Anywhere 10 as your back-end database for .NET activity
In addition, we’ll present:
- A special early morning session on troubleshooting installation issues
- Information on companion products from ISUG partners
- Tips and Tricks on migrating to PowerBuilder 11 from earlier versions
PLUS! A very special first for PowerBuilder users as Enable Development introduces its Source Change for PowerBuilder! Be the first to see this awesome technology first-hand — a tool no serious PowerBuilder developer can be without!
All events begin at 8:00am local time, and end at 5:30pm.
To register for this tour, visit: www.isug.com/pb11tour_registration. Registration fees for this event are as follows:
Pre-Registration (more than 3 days prior to the event):
- ISUG Members – Gold Benefits – $99
- ISUG Members – Silver Benefits – $129*
- ISUG Members – Basic Benefits – $179*
- Non-Members – $249+
Last-Minute/Onsite Registration (3 days or less prior to the event):
- ISUG Members – Gold Benefits – $149
- ISUG Members – Silver Benefits – $179*
- ISUG Members – Basic Benefits – $229*
- Non-Members – $299+
* Includes upgrade to Gold Benefits
+ Includes ISUG membership with Gold BenefitsNon-members: Save $55 by joining ISUG here for just $95, and then register at the discounted Gold price!!!
Businesses: Want to send multiple employees? Ask us about our corporate discounts! Send an email to – Be sure to specify how many people you will be sending.
All attendees wishing to participate hands-on should bring a laptop pre-installed with the required software (provided by the ISUG Gold Benefits package). Note that this is not required to attend, only if you wish to follow along with the labs.
