|
| |
A Customer's Perspective
|
|
| |
Getting started with Synergy objects
by Chris Blundell, Sr. Systems Integration Architect
United Natural Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ: UNFI)
About United Natural Foods, Inc.
United Natural Foods, Inc. (UNFI) is the largest publicly traded wholesale distributor to the natural and organic foods industry. Carrying more than 40,000 products, the company supplies over 18,000 customers nationwide and services a wide variety of retail formats, including super natural chains, independent natural products retailers, and conventional supermarkets.
Technology
The UNFI core business systems are written mainly in Synergy/DE on an OpenVMS Alpha cluster. We have worked on leveraging our systems to provide value to both our internal and external customers, using a combination of Synergy/DE and other technologies. Until recently, we did our development on the Alphas using EVE, TPU, or EDT—the tools of choice for many OpenVMS developers. However, we recently began using Synergy/DE Professional Series Workbench. Due to features like tagging, syntax highlighting, and syntax completion abilities, Workbench has become our primary development environment and is very well received by our developers.
Why we are upgrading to version 9
I’m a bit of a technology freak, and using Workbench has been a huge advantage for me since I’m able to use a newer version of Synergy/DE on Windows than on OpenVMS. This allows me to try out new features of the language and be ready to implement them as soon as they become available on OpenVMS. This has enabled me to start playing with version 9.
From a company standpoint, the move to version 9 is critical because it enables us to stay current. For me personally, the new features in version 9 are a much more compelling reason to upgrade. Specifically, the new object support is going to be huge. So much of what we write is the same thing over and over, and objects are a great way of encapsulating code and making it extensible. In addition, namespaces will allow us to arrange classes into logical groups. The new TRY-CATCH-FINALLY logic is wonderful too; the idea of using ONERROR has always been painful to me, since I really hate GOTO logic, and an ONERROR is exactly that when it comes down to it. I can’t say I was surprised by the Synergex implementation of objects, but I was very pleased that it fit right in with what I have come to expect from Synergex, which is flexible and easy-to-use products.
That being said, what’s in version 9 that I want? In a word, objects. I feel like I have a little bit of an advantage here since I’ve been doing a lot of work (and play) with the Microsoft .NET framework over the last few years, so I’m pretty familiar with OO development. I’m not a purist with OO, and I don’t get into all the theory of when, where, what, and how, but I’ve found out from trial and error what works well and what doesn’t—pretty much the way I learn everything.
What we’ve done so far
Since version 9 was announced, I’ve been contemplating what parts of our system would benefit from being rewritten using an object methodology. The parts that sprang to mind were the FTP client I put together a few years ago (available on the Synergex CodeExchange) and our pricing routines.
Read the full article. |
| |
| top |
| |
|
| |
Synergy/DE 9.1.1b is now available on all supported platforms
Synergy/DE 9.1.1b is now available on all supported platforms. On Windows and OpenVMS, all product download files have been replaced. On UNIX, the License Manager, Language, UI Toolkit, and Connectivity Series product downloads have been replaced.
Upgrade today*.
*Attention HelpDesk Support customers: After clicking on the above link, log into the Resource Center. You'll then be redirected to the appropriate page. Not yet on HelpDesk Support? Contact your SynergyDE account manager to sign up. |
| |
| top |
| |
|
| |
| Spotlight on Synergy/DE 9 |
| |
Upgrade to Synergy/DE 9 to improve the quality of your applications
This is the second in a series of articles that describe the many reasons to upgrade to Synergy/DE 9. In the first article, we talked about how Synergy/DE 9 will improve your productivity. In this article, we’ll describe how version 9 will improve the quality of your applications.
When you release a high-quality application, your users are happy because their software works, your developers are happy because they don’t have to spend a lot of time fixing bugs, and your managers are happy because you look good to your users and your development resources are being used efficiently. The importance of high-quality software can not be overstated. Synergy/DE 9 includes a number of features that can help you significantly improve your application quality (and make a lot of people happy).
Improved error detection
The new Synergy/DE 9 compiler enforces correct syntax more strictly than earlier Synergy/DE compilers, so it will detect many errors that previously slipped through. Part of this strictness is the new strong prototyping feature, which ensures that routines are used as intended. For example, it validates that required arguments are passed and that their data types are correct. All Synergy/DE-supplied routines are automatically prototyped, and you can define prototypes for your own routines. When you define prototypes, in addition to specifying the type and (optionally) the dimensions, you can now also specify whether arguments are required or optional, as well as the direction of the data flow (in, out, or inout). Here’s a sample routine declaration:
subroutine InputProcessingMethod, reentrant, stack
in required CompositeID ,i ;windowID
inout required DataArea ,a ;data
in optional MenuColID ,i ;column ID
proc
endsubroutine
Composite windows
A composite window consists of a parent window and child windows, and it functions and appears to the user as a single window. For example, a composite window could have input fields at the top for header information, a table in the middle for line-item entry, a multi-line field that supports rich text editing through an ActiveX control, and buttons. Composite windows will help you improve the quality of your user interfaces.
Workbench improvements
We have refined and extended Workbench’s Synergy Language support in several areas, making it easier for you to create and maintain high-quality code. For example, GROUP arguments are now supported, and we’ve improved our support when including from the repository.
Structured exception handling
This new method for handling errors is more flexible and more structured than ONERROR, and it enables you to be as specific as you want when detecting errors. Better error detection and reporting will improve application quality.
INIT statement
INIT initializes a named data structure to its default values. Alpha fields are initialized to spaces, decimals to zero, and integers to null. This feature will help you ensure that fields are initialized correctly.
For more information about these or other Synergy/DE 9 features, refer to
- the Synergy/DE 9 Web site
- the Synergy/DE 9 Online Manuals* (available to HelpDesk Support customers in our Resource Center)
or contact your Synergy/DE account manager.
*Attention HelpDesk Support customers: After clicking on the above link, log into the Resource Center. You'll then be redirected to the appropriate page. Not yet on HelpDesk Support? Contact your SynergyDE account manager to sign up. |
| |
| top |
| |
|
| |
| |
Application Level Encryption: What implications does this have?
Synergex CTO Roger Andrews discusses this topic in his latest blog. You are welcome to add comments to the blog. Simply fill out the comment form below Roger’s article. |
| |
| |
|
| top |
| |
|
|
|
| |
What Is Business Intelligence?
An article from Synergex’s newest division, VisualSmart
Business intelligence, also commonly referred to as BI, is a modern business management term referring to software applications and technologies that are used to gather, provide access to, and analyze data about various company operations.
Business intelligence methodology recognizes that in today’s computer-driven business world, much more data is gathered than can possibly be analyzed using traditional spreadsheets and reports.
Business intelligence applications can help companies have a more comprehensive knowledge of the various factors affecting their business, such as metrics on sales, production, inventory, internal operations, financials, etc. The VisualSmart model allows users to discover, analyze, and cross-analyze relationships between these metrics, and also to explore historical and future trend data. The information revealed by business intelligence metrics can help managers to make better, quicker, and more appropriate business decisions.
Business intelligence saves time
The concept of business intelligence is not new: business people have always struggled with storing and then accessing their data in ways that allowed them to determine their ultimate profitability, and, hopefully, glean hints on ways to grow the business and become even more profitable.
While the original business intelligence users were satisfied with just knowing if their businesses were profitable or not, today’s managers require much more information to compete in the marketplace. In addition, they must be agile and make critical decisions quickly. Time itself has become the most valuable—and the most limited—commodity in business.
Business intelligence allows decision makers to use data-based metrics rather than guesswork to formulate their actions. Metrics that expose the historical nuances of changing customer demand, for example, can assist a buyer to assess the trend and adjust an order to avoid costly unsold inventory while anticipating actual needs. All of the metric views and reports required to make such a decision can be placed on a dashboard, where any critical changes can be immediately seen, assessed, and addressed. This time savings alone is a tremendous asset for any busy manager.
Contact us to learn more. |
| |
| top |
| |
|
| |
| |
Synergy-e-Quiz |
|
| |
Submit your answers and be in the running for the third $100 gift check. Test your Synergy/DE and trivia knowledge. Answer questions, win prizes. Play now.
Curious about the answers to the last round of questions?
Find out which answers were correct, and why.
top |
|
| |
|
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
|
| |
|
| |
| |
Support Tech Tip
|
|
| |
How to convert a source file into a Workbench alias
Do you have a piece of code that you want to convert and use as a Workbench alias? Previously, the most time-consuming part of this was converting the tab characters to “%\i”. Well, not any more.
In Workbench you can use the Replace function to replace the tab character with its alias equivalent by executing the following steps. With the code you want to use as an alias displayed in the Edit window,
- Select Search > Replace (Ctrl+R).
- Select the Use check box, and make sure “Regular expression (UNIX)” is selected in the drop down list.
- Enter “\t” in the Search for field.
- Enter “%\i” in the Replace with field.
- Click the Replace All button.
- Copy and paste your code into Workbench’s Alias Editor dialog. (To get to the Alias Editor dialog, select Tools > Options> Aliases and select an alias file in the Select Alias File dialog.)
|
|
| |
|
|
| top |
| |
|
|
| |
|
|
| Synergex Platform News |
| |
Microsoft
Windows Server 2008: Need to know
July 31, 2007
Visual Studio 2008, .NET 3.5 reach Beta 2; Silverlight 1.0 hits RC
July 26, 2007
Linux
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.1 beta released
August 1, 2007
Linux: It's not just for servers anymore
July 26, 2007
IBM
IBM launches 16-core processor server
July 27, 2007 |
|
| |
|
|
| top |
| |
|
| |
| |
| Synergex Education and Events |
|
|
September 5, 2007 - 8AM PDT - Workbench Highlights* - At your desk
*All attendees receive a free t-shirt!
November 20, 2007 - 8AM PDT - Workbench Highlights* - At your desk
*All attendees receive a free t-shirt! |
|
|
|
|
| |
top |
| |
| |
Subscribe
to Synergy-e-News.
To view past issues of Synergy-e-News, see the Synergy-e-News
Archive.
To remove yourself from the Synergy-e-News mailing list, please
click here.
Trademarks:
Synergex, Synergy, Synergy Development Environment, Synergy/DE,
and all other Synergy/DE product names are trademarks of Synergex.
All other product and company names in this newsletter are
trademarks of their respective holders.
Synergex
International · 2330 Gold Meadow Way · Gold
River, CA 95670
+1 916.635.7300 | 800.366.3472 (North America) | 0800.898.368
(United Kingdom)
Copyright © 2007 Synergex International Corporation.
All rights reserved.
Synergy-e-News
08092007 |
| |
|
|
