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PixieWebŪ How It Builds Web Interfaces

PixieWeb Documentation Live Demos Persistence Explained PixieWeb Primer PixieWeb Commands PocketPC Apps. Field-by-Field Apps Remote Scripting Example MV Code Downloads

View Diagram of PixieWeb PixieWebŪ (PEWeb for non-PICK) is a general purpose connectivity device operating between Windows and many text-based systems. It is an ActiveX .dll providing access to the text-system via Telnet and is a general connectivity alternative for ODBC. Clients can be browsers, VB (or other COM aware languages), as well as Windows desk-top applications (VBA). BUT, it includes a special command-set to deliver HTML from a text-style application (e.g. PICK, COBOL) to the browser. PixieLinkŪ (PEDirect for non-PICK). It's key feature allows the building of GRAPHICAL user interfaces with HTML that is generated by the text serving program. But unlike most competing products, PixieWebŪ (and PixieLinkŪ) provide field-by-field, interactive editing and server response to each data entry action, just like your green-screen software.PixieWeb can connect directly to MV data, or to PICKBasic, Basic, COBOL, C, or filePro programs. The browser-user-interface (BUI) is a significant feature of PixieWeb, and it's Key web-enabling features include: 1) Persistent or non-persistent connections, 2) Connects to conventional text serving programs, or MV data, 3) Field-by-field interactivity or batch processing of forms, 4) Web-server may be IIS or Apache (batch only), 5) Multiple client options, 6) Uses fast and reliable Telnet, 7) GUI driven by application-side processing, 8) The data base may be stored on Windows or *Nix. The GUI is achieved by adding HTML markup tags to the output of text-based programs, and the tags do much the same job as the traditional terminal escapes, (e.g. "<" and ">") which play a role similar to CHAR(27). HTML may include such things as references to other web documents using hyperlinks, instructions for text formatting (e.g. color, size and position) and other content such as image placement. HTML 4.0 has introduced equivalent functionality, which in our PixieWeb work looks like: <div class=label1 style="TOP:100;LEFT:180">Customer:</div> PixieWeb and PixieLink are synchronised with the whole web culture by conversing in HTML. VARs can now learn one widely applicable HTML standard which works across all PixieWare display systems. In this unified PixieWare environment, web pages (including the associated HTML) are generated from within text-based programs. The output (CRT) of the program includes markup strings built by subroutines (WEBDX, WEBIX, etc..) which translate the traditional green-screen @(x,y) co-ordinates into positioning co-ordinates that a web browser or PixieLink can process. e.g. SC = SC:@(10,10):"Customer"  is replaced by: CALL WEBDX(10,10,0,0,"Customer","","",SC) PRINT SC Specialised routines, WEBIX, WEBDX, and WEBMX, are supplied with PixieWeb and PixieLink to assist with web-page formatting. Field-by-field interactive processing of input data is supported. Events occurring on a browser or PixieLink (e.g. mouse clicks, mouse movements, field value changes) invoke server-side operations to update the current page without repainting it. Browser/PixieLink events can trigger database responses without waiting for a page to be submitted, making the GUI interface interactive and responsive. Also supplied with PixieWare are all the necessary ASP Scripts, plus a useful yet simple method to publish tabular data on a web page using our special VBScript functions. The combination of PxRowSet, which places the data into a 2 dimensional array, and SelectResult which extracts the data from the array, presents the data directly into HTML tables. Because PixieLink is also a green-screen terminal emulator, it can process the character style of output so a mixture of the two styles can co-exist. HTML processing is initiated for example by: PRINT "<TX>OK</TX>", otherwise it defaults to green-screen mode. For a small user who wants a browser user interface (GUI) for internal use only and does not want to provide access via the web, PixieLink is an inexpensive substitute for the combination of IIS and PixieWeb. It requires the same re-programming of the text-based software that is required for the use of a browser. It eliminates the need for IIS and the maintenance of it, for in-house use. Since it is a direct Telnet connection, it provides the same field-by-field editing capabilities as PixieWeb. Applications initially developed with PixieLink may subsequently be published on the web by installing PixieWeb and a web server, without any further change to the application. The PixieLink is also a valid large-scale solution in its own right. It does require a one-off installation on each client machine, but it does offer some features that browsers do not: e.g. file upload/download initiated and controlled by text-based programs, and these programs can also remote-control Windows programs e.g. Word Processing. PixieLink is useful in allowing simple web trials to be conducted in-house and offers a unified web serving migration path through PixieWeb. The PixieWeb and PixieLink combination allows for a mix of user interfaces to be supported - HTML GUI and traditional character mode - and incorporated with the PixieWeb licence is a full site licence for PixieLink. In the same manner as above, XML may also be generated from within a MV environment. PixieWeb Documentation With PixieWebŪ, e-Commerce is not a revolution it is an evolution.

Email: sales@pixieware.com

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