I know I've seen posts on here from at least one user of Alpha XBasic software. I'm now on day 15 of my 30 day trial and have a few generic questions...
Stuff like: Is Alpha Anywhere mostly about Javascript/HTML5 and brings along the XBasic and Alpha5 infrastructure as a freebie? Or is the Alpha5 XBasic more integral and important than it seems to be. (It seems most tasks are accomplished with Javascript.)
Is the Client/Server version ($2500 year) worth the extra $1k over the basic package, or can the server functions be accomplished in other ways? I have a copy of and have used FoxWeb, which has always seemed clunky, but it works. Could that be used in place of the Alpha Anywhere Client/Server or is that a false savings?
Is the Alpha Anywhere documentation as bad as I think it is? Or am I just acting my age ("You kids! Get off my lawn!")
And a few other tidbits.
I'd be happy to take this off-list if it produces too much noise for everyone, but then maybe some others would find the info useful...I dunno.
Thanks for any responses.
Mike Copeland
Yeesh, dude, read what you wrote before sending!
My second Q (below) should have said that I'm thinking about the $1500/year version of Alpha Anywhere (client-side only) and pairing it with Foxweb on the server end. If you're not familiar with Foxweb, you submit text indicating functions and parameters via HTML put and get back HTML strings of data. I know Alpha Anywhere's server can do a lot more than that, but I'm not sure I need all the bells and whistles.
Mike
Mike Copeland wrote:
I know I've seen posts on here from at least one user of Alpha XBasic software. I'm now on day 15 of my 30 day trial and have a few generic questions...
Stuff like: Is Alpha Anywhere mostly about Javascript/HTML5 and brings along the XBasic and Alpha5 infrastructure as a freebie? Or is the Alpha5 XBasic more integral and important than it seems to be. (It seems most tasks are accomplished with Javascript.)
Is the Client/Server version ($2500 year) worth the extra $1k over the basic package, or can the server functions be accomplished in other ways? I have a copy of and have used FoxWeb, which has always seemed clunky, but it works. Could that be used in place of the Alpha Anywhere Client/Server or is that a false savings?
Is the Alpha Anywhere documentation as bad as I think it is? Or am I just acting my age ("You kids! Get off my lawn!")
And a few other tidbits.
I'd be happy to take this off-list if it produces too much noise for everyone, but then maybe some others would find the info useful...I dunno.
Thanks for any responses.
Mike Copeland
[excessive quoting removed by server]
Hi Mike,
I've taken a look at AlphaFive from time to time based on customer interest in this product.
You would think that with Dan Bricklin at the CTO helm this would be a killer product, but I'm just not seeing it. http://www.alphasoftware.com/people.asp
Like you I found the documentation disappointing and the underlying VB-like language kludgey.
Would love to hear some great feedback - this is a product I really wanted to like.
Malcolm
The time-limited trial approach is kinda crap these days too IMO. I don't think 30 days is enough for a working developer with other things going on to fully evaluate a platform like this. They should take the Servoy\Lianja approach of a 'community' version that you can use for non-commercial projects with support only via the forum.
Oh there's no forum. Often a bad sign.
Thanks, Malcolm!
Well, my great feedback is that I would really like for the premise AA brings to be true...write once and deploy as web browser page, IOS app, and Android app, as well as a Windows fat client. And, after spending considerable time watching video, reading, and hands-on, I think the power and ability is there, but this really reminds me of herding cats!
Some problems seem so obvious: the editing of code for events is done in modal windows. So if you're writing/editing code in the click event of a button, you have to close that window to go look for the name of an object you want to reference. (Yes, I know there are popups that provide suggestions all over the place, but so far I haven't gotten my head wrapped around what those popups are providing.)
In general, the interface was obviously designed by someone intimately familiar with the system over a period of time, but without a road map or master plan. It just feels like 'this' was tacked on to 'that' which used to be called 'those' and was added to 'them.' And all along the way, they didn't bother to document anything.
In their defense, there are hundreds of hours of video, free for the watching, but as I told the salesrep I spoke with, you can't keyword search a video and you have to sit and pay attention to the entire thing to get (maybe) what you were looking for. And, some of the videos were made by people who obviously didn't receive any training in speaking (every other word is "uhm").
Like you, I want this to work. That's why I wanted to ask some general questions to determine if there is light at the end of this long dark tunnel.
I did submit a pre-sales question email and, in what seems to be the Alpha-way, it precipitated an online video/voice conference with myself, a sales rep, and a technician. Kind of overkill considering that my question was to confirm that their server software could be deployed without a Windows Server license. So I tried to be supportive and asked a few other Qs for clarification... "Is Alpha Anywhere the successor to and based on (and therefore inclusive of) Alpha 5?" Answer: Yes "Does AA read and write natively to DBF files without corruption during multi-user access?" Answer: Yes. A5 used DBF files as its main, native format for data storage. And I had a how-to question about passing data values from one object to a memory variable, and the tech was very quick to provide the same answer I had already found (but it threw an error message when I tried it). After that the tech said he needed to get on another call and excused himself. Turned out that my error was due to having started with an example object and making changes that broke the design.
All in all, some odd choices for how to present their product, a premium price, in my opinion, and a pretty steep hill to climb to overcome the poor documentation. I did point out to the salesrep that the docs were poor....in typical salesrep style he agreed completely and said that was a very high priority to fix...in fact, they have hired someone to clear it up.
One final item. As $2500/year is a bit steep for my needs, the salesrep asked if I had a client that I could charge it off to. I said that my clients pay all my bills, eventually. I'm not sure he got that. Then he offered that if I wanted to pay for three years in advance, they would consider it a license for life. In other words, $7500 now and nothing ever again. But, that would not include any bug fix releases or upgrades, ever. I would come back to any subsequent product release as a new customer. While interesting, that just doesn't feel like a good option to me, considering the newness of the HTML5 platform and rapid change of mobile platforms.
Mike
Malcolm Greene wrote:
Hi Mike,
I've taken a look at AlphaFive from time to time based on customer interest in this product.
You would think that with Dan Bricklin at the CTO helm this would be a killer product, but I'm just not seeing it. http://www.alphasoftware.com/people.asp
Like you I found the documentation disappointing and the underlying VB-like language kludgey.
Would love to hear some great feedback - this is a product I really wanted to like.
Malcolm
[excessive quoting removed by server]
On Thu, 8 Sep 2016, at 08:20 AM, Mike Copeland wrote:
Alan, No, but it looks interesting. Where's the gotcha? Mike
Don't know Mike, never used or evaluated it - I saw it mentioned recently somewhere and it seemed to be in the same ballpark as Alpha 5 etc.
Good find Alan, Looks really impressive. Just generated a multi platform app in about 10 minutes albeit a fairly simple one, it works fine.
Dave
-----Original Message----- From: ProFox [mailto:profox-bounces@leafe.com] On Behalf Of Alan Bourke Sent: 07 September 2016 15:11 To: profoxtech@leafe.com Subject: Re: [NF] Looking for Alpha 5 (Alpha Anywhere) users
Have you looked at OutSystems?
On Thu, 8 Sep 2016, at 02:36 PM, Dave Crozier wrote:
Good find Alan, Looks really impressive. Just generated a multi platform app in about 10 minutes albeit a fairly simple one, it works fine.
Good to hear - no idea on pricing info / licencing though, couldn't find it anywhere!
Found this page .. need to talk to them to get a quote it seems.
https://www.outsystems.com/pricing-and-editions/
-----Original Message----- From: ProfoxTech [mailto:profoxtech-bounces@leafe.com] On Behalf Of Alan Bourke Sent: Thursday, 8 September 2016 11:53 PM To: profoxtech@leafe.com Subject: Re: [NF] Looking for Alpha 5 (Alpha Anywhere) users
On Thu, 8 Sep 2016, at 02:36 PM, Dave Crozier wrote:
Good find Alan, Looks really impressive. Just generated a multi platform app in about 10 minutes albeit a fairly simple one, it works fine.
Good to hear - no idea on pricing info / licencing though, couldn't find it anywhere!
-- Alan Bourke alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm
[excessive quoting removed by server]
When I walk into a store, and prices aren't listed on the products ... I know I'm out of my comfort zone.
-----Original Message----- From: ProFox [mailto:profox-bounces@leafe.com] On Behalf Of Darren Sent: Thursday, September 08, 2016 10:09 AM To: profox@leafe.com Subject: RE: [NF] Looking for Alpha 5 (Alpha Anywhere) users
Found this page .. need to talk to them to get a quote it seems.
https://www.outsystems.com/pricing-and-editions/
-----Original Message----- From: ProfoxTech [mailto:profoxtech-bounces@leafe.com] On Behalf Of Alan Bourke Sent: Thursday, 8 September 2016 11:53 PM To: profoxtech@leafe.com Subject: Re: [NF] Looking for Alpha 5 (Alpha Anywhere) users
On Thu, 8 Sep 2016, at 02:36 PM, Dave Crozier wrote:
Good find Alan, Looks really impressive. Just generated a multi platform app in about 10 minutes albeit a fairly simple one, it works fine.
Good to hear - no idea on pricing info / licencing though, couldn't find it anywhere!
-- Alan Bourke alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm
[excessive quoting removed by server]
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Mike Copeland