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Upcoming meeting
SWFox Preview! Two Presentations! Presentation #1 - Bo Durban - Extending VFP using the Web Browser Control AFUG is pleased to announce that Bo Durban, president of Moxie Data, Inc. will be making our first August presentation. Enhancing the user experience has become a necessity for new development. Users are demanding easier ways to navigate and view their data. There is a figurative "world" of GUI elements and libraries out there for enhancing the user experience via the web browser. Why not incorporate some of these into your Windows form applications using the Web Browser control? This session will show you how you can significantly enhance the look and feel of your application by creating custom controls based on the Web Browser control. Learn how to seamlessly display data, accept user input, and respond to events and how to hook into a world of cool visual libraries and services using the Web Browser control. Practical examples will demonstrate the benefits the Web Browser control can offer. Bo Durban is the president of Moxie Data, Inc. They are an experienced software development company. For more than 20 years, their staff has been developing a wide range of projects for numerous clients. Moxie Data, Inc. prides themselves on keeping up with and utilizing the most recent technology available. Presentation #2 - Steve Ellenoff - Creating Database Abstraction Classes in VFP: Switch your Back-End with Ease AFUG is pleased to announce that Steve Ellenoff, president of SJE Consulting will be making our second August presentation. One of the few complaints developers have about VFP is that it cannot handle true multithreaded processing. Typically developers require this functionality when implementing long running processes in order to keep the user informed visually, and even more importantly, to allow them to cancel the process before it is finished. In this session we review several ways to simulate multithreaded processing, and show how you can incorporate similar functionality in your applications. To demonstrate the code techniques, we review a VFP application that collects information in an explorer style window for all files and folders on a user's hard drive while keeping the user visually informed and allowing them to abort the process at any time Steve Ellenoff is the president of SJE Consulting / Custom Technology Solutions founded in 1999. He has been working with Foxpro since version 2.6 for Windows, and prior to that Dbase and Clipper. He and his company continue to utilize Visual Foxpro to deliver cost effective, feature rich, database intensive desktop and web solutions. Steve also has a background in C and C++ development and currently is working on an Xbox 360 video game project, as well as a custom designed Pinball Computer Replacement product.
NEW LOCATION!!! Aldo's Italian Restaurant, Atlanta, GA 6690 Roswell Rd,Directions: View Larger Map Previous meetings
SWFox Preview: Artificial Intelligence, Databases, and Visual Foxpro AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies will be making our July presentation. The subject of Artificial Intelligence was huge in the 80s and 90s but what happened? We'll be looking at the current state of artificial intelligence as it applies to business database applications in the modern environment. Using AI techniques we can build expert systems to analyze huge amounts of data, from a greater number of disparate sources, in less time, to make better business decisions that no human could hope to match. You will learn:
Kevin Cully is the owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC which designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. CULLY Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries.
"Open VFP and Technology Discussion" AFUG is pleased to announce that we will be having a group discussion at our June meeting. We'll be having an open discussion meeting. Come on out and bring up and discuss any topic you're interested in. We'll have our usual complement of door prizes.
VFP Real World Helper Applications AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies will be making our May presentation. We will be looking at a production application that Kevin has written that 'shops' various shipping companies trying to get the best rate for shipping (very) heavy items.
Kevin Cully is the owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC which designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. CULLY Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries.
"Open VFP and Technology Discussion" AFUG is pleased to announce that we will be having a group discussion at our April meeting. We'll be having an open discussion meeting. Come on out and bring up and discuss any topic you're interested in. We'll have our usual complement of door prizes.
SWFox Presentation Topic Brainstorming AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies will be making our March presentation. SWFox 2010 will be held on October 14th-17th in Mesa Arizona once again. I can tell you that it is a great Foxpro conference held at a beautiful location for a very reasonable price. SWFox is currently in a 'Call for Speakers' period which ends on March 15th. We will be using this as an opportunity to brainstorm topics that you would either [1] love to see presented at the conference or even [2] present the session yourself at the conference. In addition to pure brainstorming, we'll be taking a look at past conferences as well.
The goals of this presentation are many, from just plain raising the awareness of the SWFox conference, to an increase in the likelihood that AFUG members will become presenters at the conference! Some come out and share your thoughts on Foxpro and other conferences! Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. CULLY Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries.
Peer Code Review AFUG is pleased to announce that Russell Campbell will be making our February presentation. Russell Campbell, AFUG President and President of The Interthink Consulting Group, Inc., will be doing a presentation this month entitled "Peer Code Review." This will be based on the book "Best Kept Secrets of Peer Code Review" by Jason Cohen from SmartBear.com. As part of the review, we'll be looking at some of Russell's code (not too much snickering from the audience, please!). We'll look at some different techniques and some "practical advice" that the book offers. The Interthink Consulting Group, Inc., founded in 1987, delivers mission critical desktop and Internet-based database applications for clients in a wide variety of industries, including manufacturing, medical device testing, distribution, and education.
Design by Contract in a Visual FoxPro context! AFUG is pleased to announce that Larry Rix will be making our January presentation. You'll get to see what "Design by Contract" (DbC) is in the presentation. The most exciting part of DbC is NOT what it is, but what it will DO for you!! So, what will DbC do FOR you? By imploying DbC your code gets on-going, never-ending Design-time testing that is as spot-on and correct as YOU know how to make it. Not only does it remember your data type checking for TRUER, more consistent data typing, but -- more importantly -- you get a means to codify your business rules into your code in such a way that they are there forever (unless you remove them). Moreover, the very nature of how DbC works will capture problems with your code AT THE SOURCE and you'll avoid failures that cascade many levels up and down the call-stack before they show up as errors. DbC will give you a consistent tool for spot-checking and QA your code both in terms of technical processing checks and business rule adherance. In a nutshell -- DbC is like a steroid innouculation against not only technical errors, but violations of business and modelling rules -- all you have to know is the very SIMPLE rules of the DbC concept and HOW to apply those rules in a VFP context. Oh yeah -- one more thing -- you can apply DbC to your existing code WITHOUT FEAR of breaking it (except in a good way -- more on that at the meeting) and apply it immediately!!
For PDF creation we cry BullZip! AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies will be making our December presentation. Kevin Cully will be doing a presentation on BullZip, which is a wrapper for GhostScript so you can create PDFs from within Visual Foxpro. Afterwards, we'll have a general Q&A session - anything you have questions about, how your year went, what your goals are for next year Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. CULLY Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries.
"Open VFP and Technology Discussion" AFUG is pleased to announce that we will be having a group discussion at our November meeting. We'll be having an open discussion meeting. Come on out and bring up and discuss any topic you're interested in. We'll have our usual complement of door prizes. Monday, October 12th, 2009 New Location! SWFox Preview! Using .NET in FoxPro Applications AFUG is pleased to announce that Christof Wollenhaupt, will be making our October presentation. Despite spending his time writing way over a hundred articles for various magazines, he was awarded the Microsoft MVP award every year since 1997. For more information please visit http://www.foxpert.com. Are you still writing FoxPro DOS applications? I do. Obviously requirements for applications have changed in the past more than 15 years since the last version of FPD was released. These days our DOS application communicates with Web services, places online orders, generates PDF files and processes a number of loyalty cards. It might be unpleasant to realize, yet the truth is that a number of things are easier to do in .NET. Nowadays at least one version of the .NET framework - mostly 2.0 - is available on virtually every computer eliminating any additional runtime requirements when using .NET components. .NET isn't simply a different way of doing something. With its growing acceptance it turned into a necessity to learn .NET. Libraries and samples for new hardware almost exclusively come as .NET assemblies, whether that's a barcode scanner, a card reader or a new kind of display. This session is all about how you can use .NET as a Visual FoxPro developer to move your existing FoxPro application forward no matter how old it is. Everything covered in this session can be done with the free tools available from Microsoft and other sites. We look into generating .NET code dynamically, how to maintain the easy setup of your VFP application, how to use inter-process communication between .NET and VFP, how to create multiple threads for your VFP application very easily, how to exchange data between .NET and VFP code, and much more. This session does not cover integrating Windows Forms and Windows Presentation Foundation. Tuesday, September 8th, 2009 New Location! SWFox Preview! Integrating VFP with SourceGear Vault AFUG is pleased to announce that Walt Krzystek, senior developer and a part-owner of Matrix Imaging Solutions will be making our September presentation. Matrix provides customized document processing and mailing as an outsource function with over 500 customers producing over 10 million documents per month. Walt has used FoxPro for many years, dating back to 2.6 for DOS. Currently, Walt is working with VFP9 and SQL2005. Incorporating source control into our development environment has been one of the most enlightening experiences I've had in years. In this session, I cover the basics of why you need to be using source control, even in single developer shops. I use Vault version 4.1, which supports either a Visual Source Safe working model or a Subversion CVS model. I cover the basics of the Vault client interface and show how we've built a VFP object to drive the Vault command-line interface. For current users of Visual Source Safe interested in moving to Vault for the SQL backend, I cover the use of the built-in VSS Import Tool. We also talk about methods we've used for integrating with VFP Projects as well as running in file mode. You will learn:
Monday, August 10th, 2009 New Location! SWFox Preview! Simulating Multithreaded Processes in VFP AFUG is pleased to announce that Steve Ellenoff, president of SJE Consulting will be making our August presentation. One of the few complaints developers have about VFP is that it cannot handle true multithreaded processing. Typically developers require this functionality when implementing long running processes in order to keep the user informed visually, and even more importantly, to allow them to cancel the process before it is finished. In this session we review several ways to simulate multithreaded processing, and show how you can incorporate similar functionality in your applications. To demonstrate the code techniques, we review a VFP application that collects information in an explorer style window for all files and folders on a user's hard drive while keeping the user visually informed and allowing them to abort the process at any time Steve Ellenoff is the president of SJE Consulting / Custom Technology Solutions founded in 1999. He has been working with Foxpro since version 2.6 for Windows, and prior to that Dbase and Clipper. He and his company continue to utilize Visual Foxpro to deliver cost effective, feature rich, database intensive desktop and web solutions. Steve also has a background in C and C++ development and currently is working on an Xbox 360 video game project, as well as a custom designed Pinball Computer Replacement product.
Monday, July 13th, 2009 Developing VFP Apps for Windows Vista AFUG is pleased to announce that Doug Hennig, partner with Stonefield Systems Group will be making our July presentation. Doug Hennig and his presentation will be Developing VFP Apps for Windows Vista. Much, if not all, of this will apply to Windows 7, since it's really "Vista like it should have been." Come out and learn more about some of the *gotchas* when your desktop applications need to run on Vista and the upcoming Windows 7. Please put this date on your calendar and plan to bring an associate. Tuesday, June 9th, 2009 Advantage Database Server and Visual Foxpro AFUG is pleased to announce that Chris Franz, ADS Pre-Sales Engineer, and Phil Ruebel, ADS Sales of Sybase will be making our June presentation. You already know that Visual FoxPro is one of the best tools available for application development, but did you know that Advantage Database Server has better support for Visual FoxPro than any other database engine? Join us Tuesday, June 9th, as we take you on a tour through the product. We'll introduce you to Sybase and how Advantage fits into the big picture there. Then, we'll move on to the technical aspect of the server and why it's different than any other database engine. You'll see getting started tips and demos to view first hand just how easy it is for FoxPro developers to move to client/server with Advantage. We'll even provide development versions of the software for attendees. See you on the June 9th Monday, July 13th, 2009 Developing VFP Apps for Windows Vista AFUG is pleased to announce that Doug Hennig, partner with Stonefield Systems Group will be making our July presentation. Doug Hennig and his presentation will be Developing VFP Apps for Windows Vista. Much, if not all, of this will apply to Windows 7, since it's really "Vista like it should have been." Come out and learn more about some of the *gotchas* when your desktop applications need to run on Vista and the upcoming Windows 7. Please put this date on your calendar and plan to bring an associate. Tuesday, March 10th, 2009 New Location! Virtualization - Your guarantee that your Foxpro apps will run forever. AFUG is pleased to announce that Steve Ellenoff, president of SJE Consulting will be making our March presentation. Virtualization is an amazing technology which is transforming the IT lanscape everywhere. I'll be reviewing what it is, how it works, and how you can take advantage of it to improve everything related to IT for you and your office. After an overview of the current virtualization software options, I'll demonstrate some VMWARE software with tips on setting it up, and how to utilize this technology to maximize your development productivity. I'll also show how you can take advantage of this technology to guarantee that your Foxpro apps ( even Foxbase ) will run on future operating systems forever. As a bonus, during the demonstration I'll also introduce Windows Home Server and outline some of it's really cool features that I've just begun to play with. Steve Ellenoff is the president of SJE Consulting / Custom Technology Solutions founded in 1999. He has been working with Foxpro since version 2.6 for Windows, and prior to that Dbase and Clipper. He and his company continue to utilize Visual Foxpro to deliver cost effective, feature rich, database intensive desktop and web solutions. Steve also has a background in C and C++ development and currently is working on an Xbox 360 video game project, as well as a custom designed Pinball Computer Replacement product.
GKK Development Tools for VFP AFUG is pleased to announce that Gregory Green, SAP Contractor will be making our February presentation. Greg will be presenting his developer tools, known collectively as GKK Comparison tools, GKK Visual Class Editor, GKK Form Editor, GKK Menu Editor, GKK Procedure Editor, and GKK Program Manager - the 'GKK' stands for Greg-Kim-Katie. These tools initially began as a desire for improvements in the standard editors in VFP - which included line numbers in column, block matching, column selection and others. Originally the intent was to build and market these tools, however the time to develop and support the tools precluded that option and the tools are now being freely provided to the VFP community. Due to the main editor code being licensed, these tools cannot be released with source. However, these are available for download at the Universal Thread. Gregory Green is a SAP Contractor by day and a VFP developer by night. He has been working with Foxpro since version 1.0 for DOS. Greg began an SAP career back in the mid 90's after being on an SAP implementation project and was trained in ABAP (proprietary language for SAP) and is now working with the SAP Netweaver product Master Data Management. However, he never left his programming in Visual FoxPro. He has developed several applications that he uses himself (a home budget management program and a Bible Study program) and has been most recently working on developer tools for building applications.
Compressing files and directories using VFPCompression.FLL AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies will be making our January presentation. Craig Boyd, Sweet Potato Software, Inc., has released a great (and free) tool for the VFP community to use inside of our desktop and web applications. Learn how to leverage this great tool by using an easy to use class library to interface with VFPCompression.fll. Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. CULLY Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries.
AFUG is pleased to announce that we will be having Doug Straw give our November presentation. Title: Security loopholes in FoxPro executables One of Doug's clients has purchased a business application written in VFP. As we all know, off-the-shelf applications usually don't do everything we need, do more than we need, and, occasionally, do things we don't want them to do. In his presentation he will demonstrate how to get around these annoyances, without decompiling/Re-Foxing the executable, by creating a VFP wrapper application and some carefully designed triggers/stored procedures. During run-time you will be able to: 1. Access all the compiled application’s objects, classes, procedures, and methods. 2. Insert your own objects & code directly into the running application. 3. Manipulate the application’s forms & menus on-the-fly. 4. Intercept and modify data during real-time. These techniques will also show some security holes you might want to close in your own applications.
AFUG is pleased to announce that we will be having a Bo Durban, President of Moxie Data, give our September presentation. VFP 9 and SP2 Reporting Component Basics This session shows the fundamentals of the VFP 9 ReportListener and what's new with SP2. This includes an explanation of the ReportListener object model and how to leverage this class for your reports, what's required for VFP 9 reporting distribution, how to extend the VFP 9 reporting APPs and an introduction to the many new features in SP2. The session also includes tips and tricks for getting the most out of VFP 9 reporting including some productivity and performance enhancements. We will also cover the fact that the VFP 9 Reporting components are now part of the CodePlex/VFPX project and how to submit bugs and enhancement requests.
AFUG is pleased to announce that we will be having a group presentation. Bring your VFP programming problem and get a solution If you've got a problem, collectively we have the solution. If there is something nagging your business, or the need for technical know-how is burning you, bring your problem or issue with you. The group as a whole will attempt to solve it live! LOCATION: KC Pit BBQ, Sandy Springs, GA
AFUG is pleased to announce that Russell Campbell, President of the Interthink, Inc. will be making our July presentation. FoxCharts : Graphs in Visual Foxpro Wanna create some cool charts in VFP? Russell Campbell of Interthink will be demonstrating the latest developments with this very cool Foxpro tool: FoxCharts! The goals of FoxCharts is to create good looking and modern charts in pure VFP, with NO ActiveX components, with an easy setup, that is easy to customize, where the charts are easy to save to disk or print, that the project is Open Source, that benefits from all the GdiPlusX drawing capabilities, allowing users to modify the charts the way they like. If that sounds good to you, come on out and learn more about FoxCharts!
AFUG is pleased to announce that Alan Stevens, President of the East Tennessee .NET Users Group will be making our May presentation. Ignorance is Bliss: Why You Don't Need to Know Where or How Your Data is Stored? Persistence Ignorance means that an application has no intimate knowledge of where data comes from and how it is stored. Benefits of persistence ignorance include a more maintainable and flexible architecture able to support different data sources and deployment scenarios. We examine how we can best abstract the source of data from the logic accessing the data. We will use XML as the transport method for our data from a variety of backend sources including VFP tables, SQL Server and SQL Compact Edition. We examine the options for accessing our data repository through local objects, web services and COM+. You will learn:
AFUG is pleased to announce that Don Higgins of Common Sense Software will be making our April presentation.
Don's product allows racers to turn in faster times. But he's not only the Visual Foxpro programmer - he's a customer, too, since he also races. Click here to read what Calvin Hsia wrote about Don and Crew Chief Pro. As you can probably imagine, this should be quite an interesting presentation. I believe he'll have lots of stories to tell.
AFUG is pleased to announce that Paul James of Life Cycle Technologies will be making our March presentation.
Using your VFP skills in Ruby on Rails This session will attempt to draw parallels between Ruby on Rails and VFP to allow the experienced VFP programmer to apply their knowledge to the web platform. We will not get down to comparing function calls, but we will try to map the VFP tools and concepts (that we all know and love) to their web-based programming counterparts. We will start with "Why Ruby on Rails", show some real-world examples of functioning sites, then move into the "How", and end up at the "Where Do I Start". I will be giving some specific advice on which tools to use, what books to read, and how to avoid some of the newbie pitfalls.
[Ruby On Rails - Notes - 4.6M]
AFUG is pleased to announce that Dave Bernard of The Intellection Group, Inc. will be making our February presentations.
1) A demonstration of SQLCompare from www.red-gate.com Dave Bernard, is the Co-Founder of The Intellection Group, Inc. Dave has been a software developer, manager and executive for over 25 years. He has worked in FoxPro continuously from version 1.02 through VFP 9 beta, is Vice President of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group and holds MCSD and MCDBA certifications. He currently specializes in Internet-based extranet development using VFP and SQL Server and has recently been immersed in creating applications incorporating voice recognition, text-to-speech, natural language and RFID. LOCATION: KC Pit BBQ, Sandy Springs, GA
What's around the corner for VFP Part 2: Sedna AFUG is pleased to announce that Bo Durban of Moxie Data, Inc. will be making our January presentation. This presentation should help answer any questions related to the next release of Visual FoxPro: What is Sedna? What is VFPX? What is SP2 going to do for me? What's up with Vista? There are many reasons to be excited about the new release of VFP. Find out how you can take advantage of it now and how you can be a part of it. We hope to see you there! Bo Durban is a partner with Moxie Data, Inc. and he specializes in web and database development using Visual FoxPro, ASP.NET and SQL Server. Moxie Data, Inc. specializes in the development of enhanced database and reporting tools for developers. LOCATION: KC Pit BBQ, Sandy Springs, GA
December AFUG meeting cancelled Due to the conflict with the holiday events, the AFUG board has decided not to have an AFUG meeting this month. Please stay tuned for more great presentations in 2008!
[1] What's around the corner for VFP AFUG is pleased to announce that Bo Durban of Moxie Data, Inc. will be making our November presentation. This presentation should help answer any questions related to the next release of Visual FoxPro: What is Sedna? What is VFPX? What is SP2 going to do for me? What's up with Vista? There are many reasons to be excited about the new release of VFP. Find out how you can take advantage of it now and how you can be a part of it. The second part of the presentation will cover new enhancements related to the ReportListener. Find out how easy it is to not only customize your report output but also customize the report designer using the GDIPlusX library. This will not just be a show and tell, but will provide real world examples with source code that you should be able to leverage right away. We hope to see you there! Bo Durban is a partner with Moxie Data, Inc. and he specializes in web and database development using Visual FoxPro, ASP.NET and SQL Server. Moxie Data, Inc. specializes in the development of enhanced database and reporting tools for developers. LOCATION: KC Pit BBQ, Sandy Springs, GA
REALbasic for the Visual Foxpro Developer AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies will be making our October presentation. REALbasic is a cross-platform RAD tool that Fox developers can take to easily. In this session we are going to take an honest look at REALbasic and see how it compares to Visual FoxPro. REALbasic isn't free, and it isn't open sourced. This may fit just fine with your future development plans. Kevin Cully takes a long look at this tool, strengths and weaknesses. Also in this session, Kevin Cully will demonstrate one approach to developing cross platform desktop and web applications using REALbasic. Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. CULLY Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries. CULLY Technologies is also a sponsor and organizer of the FoxForward 2007 conference to be held in Alpharetta, Georgia in September. LOCATION: KC Pit BBQ, Sandy Springs, GA
Data Warehousing with VFP AFUG is pleased to announce that Tod McKenna of Blackstone Providence and DataIMC will be making our September presentation.The objective of this presentation will be to show you how you can use VFP to develop a working prototype of a Data Warehouse. This would include ETL, creating a dimensional model, and running basic queries using the warehouse. He will cover the following points: Overview of data Warehousing. creating a dimensional model, ETL data integration using VFP, running jobs, incremental updates, and running queries against the dimensional model. LOCATION: Aldo's Italian Restaurant, Atlanta, GA
VFP Used For Data Analysis AFUG is pleased to announce that Lou Shepherd of Matrix Decisions will be making our August presentation. The premise is this: Imagine that it is 1992. You are using Lotus 1-2-3 or Excel 4. You have 40,000 rows of transactional data. Your manager asks you to prepare a summary report showing revenue by region and model. We'll take a look at the 7 painful steps at doing this report, then the 2 simple steps to do it today using a way-too-little-known concept: pivot tables. Finally, with one click on a VFP form which automates the whole thing. You'll see some real world examples in solving typical data analysis issues. Time permitting, he will also delve into an object-oriented component used with VFP for automating charts, graphs and other "swell stuff". Lou has been a VFP developer and data analyst for over 18 years for several industries including his aviation software company, Matrix Decisions. LOCATION: Max & Ermas, Atlanta, GA
Textbox Autocomplete Tips and Tricks AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies will be making our July presentation. Here is the issue/problem: The client wants a lookup against existing manufacturers and constrain them (for the most part) against the existing list, but would also like to be able to add a manufacturer on the fly with as little fuss as possible. My initial thought is the combo box, but you are constrained by the contents of the combo box on what can be chosen. So then I think of the new Autocomplete feature of the textbox. Another issue is that the database for the system is in MySQL and can be large. Autocomplete only works against a VFP free table. So, how do you get autocomplete to work with a MySQL backend, large dataset, but constrained to a VFP free table? Come to the meeting to find out! Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. CULLY Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries. CULLY Technologies is also a sponsor and organizer of the FoxForward 2007 conference to be held in Alpharetta, Georgia in September. LOCATION: Max & Ermas, Atlanta, GA
VFP accessing MySQL AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies will be making our June presentation. MySQL is a very popular database solution released under the GNU license as well as for a fee without restrictions. We'll be taking a look at MySQL from a VFP perspective.
Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. CULLY Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries. CULLY Technologies is also a sponsor and organizer of the FoxForward 2007 conference to be held in Alpharetta, Georgia in September. LOCATION: Max & Ermas, Atlanta, GA
Pres. #1: Using VFP For Data Synchronization Over The Web AFUG is pleased to announce that Russell Campbell of Interthink will be making our first presentation. He will be discussing Data Synchronization over the Web. - Duration: 45 minutes Pres. #2: Favorite Software Tools Of AFUG Members This is an "open-mic" period where you, the AFUG member, can tell us about your favorite software tools. Do you have a favorite editor, accounting package, time tracking, etc. Come to the meeting and share with your peers. LOCATION: Joe's Crab Shack, Alpharetta, GA
"The Future Of VFP" AFUG is pleased to announce that we will be having a group discussion at our April meeting, discussing the recent announcement by MicroSoft in regards to releasing the Senda project as open source, and also that there are no plans to develop a version 10 of Visual FoxPro. LOCATION: Joe's Crab Shack, Alpharetta, GA Bring your thoughts and opinions to the meeting. Could we stop you even if we tried?!? {g} Much has been blogged about this subject(s) and there as been a lot of mis-information floating around in the press. Let's sit down and discuss the current state of technology, environments and what the future holds for us Fox developers. It's still bright despite what the nay-sayers may say. We'll talk about VFP 9 SP2, Sedna, VFPx, and VFPy. Hopefully, we'll be looking at the CTP of Sedna, also.
"Spring Fever Strikes" AFUG is sorry to announce that due to an outbreak of spring fever, this months meeting has been cancelled. Please check back for the topic next month.
"Instrumenting Your VFP Application" AFUG is pleased to announce that Dave Bernard, will be our speaker at our February meeting. VFP and web-based code and techniques for function and performance logging an application. This is especially appropriate for COM+ and web-based implementations, but can be adapted to desktop apps as well. Lots of examples. This is a new presentation on something Dave developed and works with everyday. LOCATION: Conarc, Alpharetta, GA Dave Bernard, is the Co-Founder of The Intellection Group, Inc. Dave has been a software developer, manager and executive for over 25 years. He has worked in FoxPro continuously from version 1.02 through VFP 9 beta, is Vice President of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group and holds MCSD and MCDBA certifications. He currently specializes in Internet-based extranet development using VFP and SQL Server and has recently been immersed in creating applications incorporating voice recognition, text-to-speech, natural language and RFID.
"YAG Talks Sedna" AFUG is pleased to announce that Y. Alan Griver, will be our special guest speaker at our January meeting. YAG will be discussing what is the latest news about Sedna and all sorts of additional technological subjects. NEW LOCATION: Georgia Tech Hotel, Atlanta, GA Yair Alan Griver is the architect for the Microsoft.com community properties. As architect, he is responsible for creating a coherent underlying platform for properties that include blogs.msdn.com, forums.msdn.com, GotDotNet, chats and CodePlex. In addition to MSCOM architect, Alan is also responsible for the continued development of Visual FoxPro. Prior to the architect role, Alan was Group Manager for the Visual Studio Data group. As Group Manager, Alan’s teams produced the tools used inside of Visual Studio .NET, Office and SQL Server that surface data capabilities, as well as Visual FoxPro. Prior to this position, Alan was a Lead Program Manager and Community Evangelist for Visual Basic .NET, driving community interests into Visual Basic .NET. Before joining Microsoft, Alan was Chief Information Officer at GoAmerica, a publicly traded telecommunications (wireless internet) company, and co-founder and CIO of Flash Creative Management a business strategy and technology consulting company. Alan is the author of five books on Visual FoxPro and Visual Basic, the creator of various development frameworks, and has developed database systems ranging into the thousands of users. He has spoken around the world on databases, object orientation and development team management issues, as well as XML and messaging-based applications.
December AFUG meeting cancelled Due to the conflict with the holiday events, the AFUG board has decided not to have an AFUG meeting this month. Please stay tuned for more great presentations in 2007!
"Drupal: An Open Source Content Management System Solution"
The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Kent Lester will be making our November presentation. Drupal is software that allows an individual or a community of users to easily publish, manage and organize a great variety of content on a website. Drupal has been growing in popularity due to it's power, extensibility, and clean core code. In fact, IBM has adopted it as a premier example of open source software. Kent Lester is a published author and former Foxpro programmer. Recently, Kent has written a desktop application for writers in Visual Foxpro and decided to use Drupal to port it to the web. Kent will be talking about Drupal and why he chose this direction instead of using Foxpro and Westwind.
"Integrating US Postal Service Webtools into VFP Desktop and Web Applications"
The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Steve Ellenoff, of SJE Computer Technology Solutions, will be making our October presentation. The presentation will demonstrate a real world case study in which a Foxpro desktop application required the ability to perform real time package tracking and shipping rate quotes (domestic & international) from the United States Postal Service (USPS). All aspects of how this technology was implemented will be reviewed and discussed both to allow programmers who require similar functionality to easily integrate it into their own projects, but even more importantly as a real world example of how good class design and the leveraging of other technologies allows the created functionality to be extensible and portable to other formats such as web based (fox & non-fox) applications.
"No meeting this month"
There won't be an AFUG meeting this month. Sorry!
"Fox Forward 2006 Teaser Sessions"
We're gearing up for the Fox Forward conference by presenting a couple of 'teaser' sessions. This provides a glimpse of what you'll be seeing at the conference and also provides some practice for two of our presenters. Bo Durban will be providing a glimpse of his "Custom Report controls" sesson along with his "Using GDI+ with VFP" presentation. Dave Bernard will be presenting a shortened version of his "Using English Query, Full-Text Indexing and VFP over the Web" presentation. For a map to the Conarc location, click here. When in the building, follow the signs to the meeting space. Bo Durban is a senior software engineer at Conarc, Inc. He specializes in web and database development using Visual FoxPro, ASP.NET and SQL Server. He is also a partner with Moxie Data, Inc. specializing in the development of enhanced database and reporting tools for developers. Dave Bernard, is the Co-Founder of The Intellection Group, Inc. Dave has been a software developer, manager and executive for over 25 years. He has worked in FoxPro continuously from version 1.02 through VFP 9 beta, is Vice President of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group and holds MCSD and MCDBA certifications. He currently specializes in Internet-based extranet development using VFP and SQL Server and has recently been immersed in creating applications incorporating voice recognition, text-to-speech, natural language and RFID.
"Using VFP to create LaTeX documents" The VFP report writer has made great advances in VFP 9 but it may not be suited to all tasks. What if you wanted to generate a book complete with cross-referenced tables, figures, mathematical equations, scientific notations, bibliographies, table of contents, indexes and more? For these purposes you might use TeX (pronounced 'Tekh') or a superset called LaTeX (lay-tekh). LaTeX is a markup language used mainly by mathematicians, scientists, and engineers in academia to create documents due to its strong typesetting characteristics. For this months meeting Kevin Cully will be demonstrating how to use a set of VFP classes to drive the process of creating LaTeX documents, tables, indexes, etc. and then turn them into PDF documents suitable for publishing. Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. Cully Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries. CULLY Technologies is also a sponsor of the Fox Forward 2006 conference to be held in Alpharetta, Georgia in September. [Provide feedback by taking our SURVEY!]
New Location!!! 1. "What's new in XCase 8.0"
2. "Visual FoxPro Client Server Data Access Techniques"
For a map to the Conarc location, click here. When in the building, follow the signs to the meeting space. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Mike Feltman will be making our May presentation. Mike Feltman has been president of F1 Technologies since founding the company in 1990. Since late 1991, Mike and his wife and partner Toni Feltman have focused on the development of the award winning FoxExpress product line.
New Date And Location!!! "Sedna, SednaX and the VFP Roadmap"
There have been many discussions about "What is the future of Visual FoxPro?". In this session we will discuss the current actions being taken by Microsoft and the VFP community that give us a glimpse into the VFP crystal ball. There are many exciting things in store for Visual FoxPro and Visual FoxPro developers and YOU can help make a difference, now more than ever. Make sure you don't miss this one! For a map to the Conarc location, click here. When in the building, follow the signs to the meeting space. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Bo Durban will be making our April presentation. Bo Durban is a senior software engineer at Conarc, Inc. He specializes in web and database development using Visual FoxPro, ASP.NET and SQL Server. He is also a partner with Moxie Data, Inc. specializing in the development of enhanced database and reporting tools for developers.
AFUG MEETING CANCELLED We are sorry to announce that we were unable to hold our March meeting. First, we'd like to thank Bo Durban for his understanding in these matters. We will work with him to reschedule his presentation as it is of great interest to FoxPro developers. As many of you know, New Horizons where we hold our meetings, is moving their facilities to Perimeter Center West. Unbeknownst to us, they have already moved a large portion of their classrooms. Because of this, and because of their paid classes taking place on Thursday, they are unable to accomodate our presentation. We will keep you informed as to the location of the April meeting date and time. Thank you, "Sedna, SednaX and the VFP Roadmap"
There have been many discussions about "What is the future of Visual FoxPro?". In this session we will discuss the current actions being taken by Microsoft and the VFP community that give us a glimpse into the VFP crystal ball. There are many exciting things in store for Visual FoxPro and Visual FoxPro developers and YOU can help make a difference, now more than ever. Make sure you don't miss this one! The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Bo Durban will be making our March presentation. Bo Durban is a senior software engineer at Conarc, Inc. He specializes in web and database development using Visual FoxPro, ASP.NET and SQL Server. He is also a partner with Moxie Data, Inc. specializing in the development of enhanced database and reporting tools for developers.
"Why I Don't Use .NET" Dave Bernard, The Intellection Group, will give a presentation on "Why I Don’t Use .NET." Dave has recently come across some really great, balanced articles by very respected people about .NET. He's attracted to them because they largely articulate what he's been saying about it himself. The VFP community is faced with the decision on whether or not to spend resources learning .NET and, if so, how much should they invest, so getting the skinny on this development tool is vital. This will be a presentation / group discussion. "PayPal as Shopping Cart Software" Russell Campbell, Interthink, will give a presentation on using PayPal on the web sites you design in place of shopping cart software. PayPal can do a lot for you and is great for many sites. The visitor can pay with a PayPal account or any of the major credit cards. You can go completely without a shopping cart, use the PayPal shopping cart, or use one of many third-party shopping carts that PayPal interfaces with.
"AJAX and FoxPro" Dave Bernard will describe, discuss and demo Asynchronous Javascript with XML (AJAX), a way of creating Web applications with mature, freely available technologies, recently made popular by Google Maps and other similar applications. It's a new way of describing a long-used methodology of developing browser-based applications with a desktop UI feel. Dave, Vice President of The Intellection Group, has been developing and deploying production "AJAX" applications for several years now, all driven by a Visual FoxPro middle-tier object doing the heavy-lifting on the server. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Dave Bernard will be making our January presentation. Dave Bernard, is the Co-Founder of The Intellection Group, Inc. Dave has been a software developer, manager and executive for over 25 years. He has worked in FoxPro continuously from version 1.02 through VFP 9 beta, is Vice President of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group and holds MCSD and MCDBA certifications. He currently specializes in Internet-based extranet development using VFP and SQL Server and has recently been immersed in RFID, speech, natural language and mobile technologies.
"Ten Practical Uses for the XMLAdapter" The XMLAdapter class and its related XMLTable and XMLField classes were introduced in VFP8 and enhanced in VFP9. This set of classes is one of the most powerful and least understood features of VFP. This session will illustrate at least 10 great use cases to leverage XMLAdapter's strengths, and will show how the XMLAdapter, XMLTable and XMLField classes can handle just about any XML task thrown at them, including several that you may have never considered. Attendees will not only see practical uses for the XMLAdapter, but will learn its most important properties and methods in the context of real-life examples. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that David Stevenson will be making our December presentation. David is the former Editor of FoxTalk Magazine. David is also a Microsoft Certified Solution Developer and have been involved with FoxPro since the early FoxBase days. He is currently specializing in migrating VFP apps and older Foxpro 2.6 apps to web front-ends and nTier design, using either VFP tables or SQL Server. David's writings can also be found on his blog at David Stevenson's Talking Fox.
"Visual Studio .NET 2005"
The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Ben Joseph will be making our November presentation. Ben will be demonstrating and discussing the newly released Visual Studio 2005. He will be giving an overview of the Team Systems and Project Mgmt, SQL Server 2005 Enhancements, and Biz Talk Server 2006. Following this introductory presentation, he will delve deeper into some of the new capabilities of ASP.NET 2.0 Ben Joseph received his masters in Computer Application from Pune University in India and has been working in Software development field in various capacities for the last 20 years. During Ben's early career, he was working on IBM mainframes and later switched to AS/400s. Ben has been working with Waffle House for the last eight years where he has been customizing and implementing JDEdwards software. At Waffle House they have been developing .NET application for the last two and half years, the majority developed using ASP.NET. Waffle house also has a Window based Interactive Coach and Training system. As Ben has moved in various jobs during the last 15 years he has always had a system in FoxPro to enhance and maintain. Waffle House has a VFP based Restaurant Info System which has been in used since last 12 years, developed originally in an early DOS version.
"GKK Project Manager"
GKK Project Manager was born from a compilation of tools that had been developed over the course of several years (searching, printing, copying, etc.). After seeing some project manager tools available on the Internet, Greg decided to build his own Project Manager that would also incorporate the other stand-alone tools. Current features include:
The "stock" project file is still maintained in the present implementation. However, it is planned to eliminate the dependency and fully replace the internal project file (it will be built on-the-fly to allow for building applications). Once this is done, multi-user capability will also be incorporated. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Greg Green will be making our October presentation. Greg's daytime job is a SAP Technical consultant specializing in the SAP Netweaver toolset. His expertise in SAP Netweaver includes Master Data Management (MDM), Exchange Infrastructure (XI), and Technical Project Planning; his expertise in ABAP tools includes workflow development, interfaces, data conversion, and user enhancements. Greg's real fun occurs at night when he is able to work on Visual FoxPro development. As a consultant (and traveling) there is a lot of time in the evenings (hotels) that allows for development of Visual FoxPro applications. Greg has been developing FoxPro applications since the days of Fox Software and FoxPro for DOS Version 1.0.
"Visual FoxPro, RFID, and Natural Language Processing"
Dave Bernard will be demonstrating and discussing a unique application based on a patent-pending horizontally integrated distributed architecture, with VFP acting as the glue that holds it all together. The application itself supports a wireless handheld-based delivery of a natural language interface that retrieves information from a remote backend database. The user speaks naturally into a microphone attached to the wireless PDA. The PDA uses a remote server to convert the spoken sentence into text, which is used by the natural language engine to create and execute a database query. Results are sent back to the PDA, which speaks the answer into the users headphones. Additionally, an RFID reader or GPS locator attached to the PDA can send proximity information along with the use query to further qualify the request. Active RFID, a relatively new technology, has been implemented in this scenario to provide proximity information from a distance, overcoming some of the limitations of passive RFID. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Dave Bernard will be making our September presentation. Dave Bernard, is the Co-Founder of The Intellection Group, Inc. Dave has been a software developer, manager and executive for over 25 years. He has worked in FoxPro continuously from version 1.02 through VFP 9 beta, is Vice President of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group and holds MCSD and MCDBA certifications. He currently specializes in Internet-based extranet development using VFP and SQL Server and has recently been immersed in creating applications incorporating voice recognition, text-to-speech, natural language and RFID.
"Fun and Games with Visual FoxPro"
One of the classic techniques when teaching programming is to have the user program some sort of simple game. Why? Well, it may have been that the teacher was too lazy to think of a real world problem to solve, but it's also because games usually require some sort of data structures to represent playing pieces (cards in a deck, for instance) and they need flow control logic to handle the choices a user can make (do I buy Park Avenue now or hope to land on it later?). And these two things are the basic building blocks for all programs. Another reason games are used is that we have often played them before so we already understand the rules and it's just a matter of writing the logic that represents those rules. And, of course, it's a game, so it should be fun (which is always a help when teaching). This month, we'll be looking at some games I've programmed in VFP and doing some group analysis and programming (reprogramming?) in order to learn and understand different techniques. These games are by no means complete - I just don't have time for that - but they got done what I wanted and now we'll use them as a learning tool. Bring your thinking cap (sorry, I couldn't resist) and be prepared to participate in a group programming experience where you will hopefully teach and be taught. FYI, the games are Solitaire, Sudoku (a Japanese number game), and a maze generating program. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Russell Campbell will be making our August presentation. Russell Campbell is president of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group, owner of The Interthink Consulting Group, Inc. and a Microsoft Certified Professional. He's been developing database applications professionally since 1989. Via Interthink, he works mostly with small to medium-sized businesses, but has also developed applications for Fortune 100 companies. Additionally, he developed an electronic catalog product for a parts manufacturer and distributor that has been released to about 3000 of that company's dealers. Interthink develops both desktop and web-based applications.
"Presentation 1: Using GDI+ Graphics on VFP Forms"
Use the GDI Plus FFC classes to create cool custom graphics in your VFP forms. Includes advanced tips and tricks like using double buffering, preserving z-order, higher quality image rendering, creating your own custom controls and more. We will even show you how to extend the FFC classes to add even more functionality. "Presentation 2: Create your own API libraries to extend VFP" Probably the greatest 3rd party addon tool for Visual FoxPro is C++. You can create lightning fast routines that can easily be called by your VFP applications. You can even use the VFP API tool kit to have C++ make callbacks into your VFP applications. Besides, there are many Windows and 3rd party APIs that can be difficult if not downright impossible to do with native VFP. This session will show you how to create your own API DLL and FLL libraries using C++ and provide you with a set of C++ utility classes that make it easier than ever to extend VFP. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Bo Durban will be making our July presentation. Bo Durban is a senior software engineer at Conarc, Inc. He specializes in web and database development using Visual FoxPro, ASP.NET and SQL Server. He is also a partner with Moxie Data, Inc. specializing in the development of enhanced database and reporting tools for developers.
"Subclassing CursorAdapter for Flexible Data Access" Many developers have seen or read about the interesting and powerful CursorAdapter base class added in VFP8 and enhanced in VFP9. However, many may still be wondering how to properly fit the CursorAdapter into a typical project architecture. This session will go beyond the CursorAdapter's syntax, properties and methods, and will focus on using the CursorAdapter effectively through subclassing. This session aims to fill in the blanks of understanding and "turn on the lights" for CursorAdapter's usefulness in a variety of development scenarios. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that David Stevenson will be making our June presentation. David is a former Editor and Associate Publisher of Code Magazine and is the current Editor of FoxTalk Magazine. David is also a Microsoft Certified Solution Developer and have been involved with FoxPro since the early FoxBase days. He is currently specializing in migrating VFP apps and older Foxpro 2.6 apps to web front-ends and nTier design, using either VFP tables or SQL Server. David will also be making this presentation at DevTeach the week following our meeting. [Images from the latest presentation!]
"Presentation 1: Builders Made Easy" Builder technology has been around since Visual FoxPro 3.0, yet to this day when the topic of builders comes up in conversation amongst developers, it is usually met with blank stares. This session will demonstrate builder technology inside of Visual FoxPro, how to leverage the existing builders (especially the cool ones included in VFP 8/9), and create and register your own builders (traditional and non-traditional ones). We will walk through several builders examples, using the "old-fashion" builder techniques, and using BuilderB techniques. Visual FoxPro 9 adds a new technology called Property Editors that work a lot like builders, but instead of the entire object, Property Editors focus on setting one property. "Presentation 2: Get More Productive with VFP" Rapid Application Development is a leftover buzzword from the 90's. Are you as productive with VFP as you can be, or wish to be? How do other developers use the world's best database application development tool to bring applications to market quicker? Are there tips I can learn to save me 10 minutes a day or an hour a week? This session will demonstrate as many tips and productivity ideas that can be crammed into the session. As the old saying goes, there are always three ways to accomplish something in VFP. Sometimes we only know one way and there are two other ways that are faster or better. VFP 9, while focused on features that effect the end user's experience, has a number of excellent productivity enhancements. The session will have productivity tips for developers working with all versions of VFP. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Rick Schummer will be making our May presentation. Rick is the president and lead geek at White Light Computing, Inc., which is headquartered in southeast Michigan, USA. He prides himself in guiding his customers' Information Technology investment toward success. He enjoys working with top-notch developers; has a passion for developing software using best practices, and for surpassing customer expectations, not just meeting them. After hours he writes developer tools that improve productivity and occasionally pens articles for FoxTalk, FoxPro Advisor, and several user group newsletters. Rick is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (VFP), and a Microsoft Certified Professional by passing both the VFP Desktop and Distributed exams. Rick is co-author of What's New In Nine: Visual FoxPro's Latest Hits, Deploying Visual FoxPro Solutions, MegaFox: 1002 Things You Always Wanted to Know About Extending Visual FoxPro and the award winning 1001 Things You Always Wanted to Know About Visual FoxPro (KiloFox) from Hentzenwerke. He is founding member and Secretary of the Detroit Area Fox User Group (DAFUG) and is a regular presenter for this organization, other user groups, and at GLGDW 2000-2003, EssentialFox 2002-2004, Southwest Fox 2004-2005, and VFE DevCon 2K2 conferences. The meeting will still take place on Wednesday 5/18 at 7:00 p.m. at New Horizons. This is our normal meeting place and time, but it's not our normal third Thursday. If you have a collegue that has an interest in Foxpro, bring them along!
"Enhancements in the VFP 9 Reporting System" For this presentation, we will be viewing a video of a presentation by Doug Hennig on the improvements to the Report Writer. The video is made available via FoxCast.org in which Doug gives a great overview of the new features and changes and delves into details, as well. I encourage you to come to learn about the new and powerful features that have been added to the Report Writer by the VFP team. It was previously announced that Y. Alan Griver would be making our April presentation. Unfortunately, YAG had to cancel his appearance at the AFUG meeting due to unforeseen circumstances. We hope to have YAG back sometime in the future. The meeting will still take place on Tuesday 4/26 at 7:00 p.m. at New Horizons. This is our normal meeting place and time, but it's not our normal third Thursday. We had rescheduled it for the 26th this month because that's when Alan was going to be in town and there was just no reason to change it back. If you have a collegue that has an interest in Foxpro, bring them along!
"Using VFP Reports in a Web Environment." The VFP report engine and designer can be a very powerful tool for presenting user data. Compared to similar reporting tools, it's hard to beat the unlimited licensing that VFP provides. Unfortunately the VFP report engine is very limited on its output options and is not very friendly when used in a background service such as in a web server. This session will show you several tips and techniques used to convert your VFP reports into electronic documents and then how to display or download them from a web page or email client. The Atlanta Foxpro Users Group is pleased to announce that Bo Durban will be making our March presentation. Bo had been a Foxpro developer for over 12 years and using VFP for his reports on the web extensively for over 4 years. Bo is also one of the original designers and author of eReports for VFP.
"Backing Up Your Visual FoxPro Data Using Visual FoxPro" Two things are certain in this life: death and taxes and hard drive failures. We always think the last one (and hopefully the first one!) is going to happen to the other guy. And though this presentation won't help you with the other issues, it is designed to help you protect your data from things that go click, pop, scratch, and kaput in the night. You'll see a VFP application, running as a service, that automates the backup of whatever files you choose. Not only will you get a look at how to create such an app, you'll also learn about running the app as a service. There's no need to skip your backups when you can let VFP do them for you. Russell Campbell is president of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group, owner of The Interthink Consulting Group, Inc. (www.interthink.com) and a Microsoft Certified Professional. He has been developing database applications professionally since the dawn of time (which herein means 1989). Via Interthink, he works mostly with small to medium-sized businesses, but has also developed applications for Fortune 100 companies. Additionally, he developed an electronic catalog product for a parts manufacturer and distributor that has been released to about 3000 of that company's dealers. Interthink develops both desktop and web-based applications.
"Developing Web Apps with West Wind Web Connection" Visual FoxPro is a great tool for developing web applications when used in conjunction with Rick Strahl's West Wind Web Connection (WWWC). This month we'll be looking at an application that is in-process and discussing how web development proceeds with VFP and Web Connection. During this presentation, you'll learn about how Internet Information Server interfaces with WWWC and how WWWC interfaces with your VFP app to deliver dynamic, data-centric information via a web site. You'll see this application in action and we'll look in detail at the code, you'll learn about creating HTML templates for use in a web app, and you'll also learn a little about JavaScript. Russell Campbell is president of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group, owner of The Interthink Consulting Group, Inc. (www.interthink.com) and a Microsoft Certified Professional. He has been developing database applications professionally since the dawn of time (which herein means 1989). Via Interthink, he works mostly with small to medium-sized businesses, but has also developed applications for Fortune 100 companies. Additionally, he developed an electronic catalog product for a parts manufacturer and distributor that has been released to about 3000 of that company's dealers. Interthink develops both desktop and web-based applications.
"AFUG December meeting cancelled" There will be no December 2004 AFUG meeting. Historically the December meeting has had a low turn-out due to other festivities. We are working hard to bring you the latest topics and demonstrations revolving around Visual Foxpro and Visual FoxPro 9.0 for 2005! Stay tuned. We do, however, have some important news to bring to you:
"A Simple VFP COM Framework for Web Applications" As business applications become increasingly Internet-centric, VFP developers are challenged to break out of the rich-client, desktop-oriented paradigm to which they've become accustomed. Dave Bernard, AFUG member and founder of the Intellection Group, Inc., will demonstrate freely available code and techniques that can be used to deploy web applications using VFP and Component Services. The presentation is geared especially for those FoxPro developers who have done little or no web and/or COM development. Dave Bernard has been working with FoxPro in various forms since 1990 (ver 1.02). He has 25 years of software development, management and executive experience in many different industries. He currently works on a mix of web development, database, voice recognition, natural language and RFID projects. He is experienced in many areas such as SQL Server, DHTML, JavaScript, VBScript, ASP, CSS, COM+, MSMQ, XML, XSL. Dave is also the founder of The Intellection Group, Inc..
"Topic: Help Desk Management System :: SupportDesk/db" In the mid to late 90's, Scott Ray with the State of Georgia, Georgia Technology Authority (GTA) wrote a Win32 based Help Desk Management System named SupportDesk/db based off a 'sister' product that ran on the IBM mainframe that was marketed by a major mainframe ISV from New York, Software Engineering of America (SEA - www.seasoft.com). It was initially developed in Foxpro for DOS (FPD) then was moved to Foxpro for Windows 2.6 (FPW), then Visual Foxpro 3.0, 5.0 and now eventually destined for 8.0/9.0. Although the Help Desk market is tough SEA found SupportDesk/db customers, Scott would like to further development of SupportDesk/db and bring it into the "Web World" and would solicit your help in this regard. Scott Ray is an employee with the State of Georgia, Georgia Technology Authority (GTA) in the Information Resources Management (IRM) Division. The Information Resources division operates the state data center, which provides around-the-clock support for more than 125 state computer systems for 76 agencies. Information Resources supports critical systems such as those used for law enforcement, child support payments, eligibility for family assistance and driver's licenses, as well as personnel, payroll, purchasing, invoice payments, billing and revenue collections. The division also advises agencies on security operations and establishes production acceptance standards for software applications. He has been working at GTA for (7) years now. First, as a consultant in the mainframe communications area for 4 years now as an employee at an IT Manager. His primary responsibilities include mainframe integration and communication strategies. Under his direction, an IRM website was developed for customer relation and interaction. [Provide feedback by taking our SURVEY!]
"Hurricane Ivan Cancels AFUG Meeting" Ivan was knocking on our door. We decided not to answer the door. For the sake of safety, the September AFUG meeting has been cancelled.
"Using Microsoft English Query and Full-Text Indexing with VFP over the Web" Dave Bernard will demonstrate and breakdown a live web-based application that encompasses several interesting technologies all working together. The application is made up of a VFP COM+ object running on a web server that manages a typical data (SQL Server) web site, but with the added ability for a user to query information via free-form English sentences. The language parsing aspect is handled by Microsoft English Query, which is bundled with SQL Server. In addition, Full-Text Indexing, also bundled with SQL Server, is used to further enhance the ability of English Query to handle requests against unorganized text objects. Dave Bernard has been working with FoxPro in various forms since 1990 (ver 1.02). He has 25 years of sofware development, management and executive experience in may different industries. He currently works on a mix of web development and database projects. He is experienced in many areas such as SQL Server, DHTML, JavaScript, VBScript, ASP, CSS, COM+, MSMQ, XML, XSL. Dave is also the owner of Dave Bernard Consulting and co-owner of Overge, Inc..
"VFP 9 review with emphasis on the changes to SQL " Members of the AFUG board will be giving us a look at some of the great new features in VFP9 as well as a look at its SQL capabilities.
"Conference Review: DevEssentials 2004, Kansas City, MO" We'll be discussing the latest and greatest features in VFP 9.0 from the A-List presenters at DevEssentials. Of course DevEssentials is much more than just a VFP conference. There was tons of information about the upcoming versions of .NET and the next version of SQL Server. In addition to new technologies, there are new methodologies and recomendations on development practices. We will be reviewing these new approaches, and of course, our own opinions on these divisive paradigms.
"Topic 1: Using Premium Mapping Services with Visual FoxPro" MapQuest and MapPoint both offer premium mapping services that can benefit many types of business applications. Real-world examples with code will be presented, along with an explanation of how to determine the best service for your application. Dave Bernard has been working with FoxPro in various forms since 1990 (ver 1.02). He has 25 years of sofware development, management and executive experience in may different industries. He currently works on a mix of web development and database projects. He is experienced in many areas such as SQL Server, DHTML, JavaScript, VBScript, ASP, CSS, COM+, MSMQ, XML, XSL. Dave is also the owner of Dave Bernard Consulting and co-owner of Overge, Inc.. [Provide feedback by taking our SURVEY!]"Topic 2: Introduction to Photoshop" Adobe Photshop is the most popular tools for creating and modifying images for web sites. Get introduced to a powerful tool, learn about layers, and effects. Then learn how to slice up an image and how this is used to create web pages that have a lasting imact. Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. Cully Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries. Kevin has been programming in FoxPro since FoxPro 2.0 for DOS in 1992 and has been programming using the Web Connection framework since 1997. [Provide feedback by taking our SURVEY!]
"Topic 1: Using Regular Expressions with VFP" Describe and demonstrate the use of Regular Expressions in Visual FoxPro, including important Internet resources to simplify implementations. "Topic 2: XML & HTTP" Demonstrate, using VFP, how to get exact driving distance between two addresses using MapQuest. Also, demonstrate a poor-man’s web service with a simple VFP/ASP combination that roundtrips an XML stream. Dave Bernard has been working with FoxPro in various forms since 1990 (ver 1.02). He has 25 years of sofware development, management and executive experience in may different industries. He currently works on a mix of web development and database projects. He is experienced in many areas such as SQL Server, DHTML, JavaScript, VBScript, ASP, CSS, COM+, MSMQ, XML, XSL. Dave is also the owner of Dave Bernard Consulting and co-owner of Overge, Inc..
"Product Demonstration of iChannel: A VFP Based Collaboration Tool over the Web" The March 18th presentation is taking a team approach! AFUG is pleased to announce that the development team from Conarc, Inc. will be presenting their "iChannel" product. Presenting will be Chet Joglekar, David Staveley, Tom Brothers, and Matthew Clark. Points of interest in the March presentation of iChannel include:
Information is power and companies are demanding improvements in the management and communication of information not only within their own organizations but also through collaboration with individuals and entities externally. iChannel is a fully web-based, collaborative document management system. iChannel delivers the means to create, share, manipulate and manage all structured and unstructured information in a simple, secure and cost-effective manner. iChannel can be deployed in both an intranet and extranet environment.
Topic 1 :: "Introduction to Stored Procedures and User Defined Functions in SQL Server" AFUG is pleased to announce that Dave Bernard will be making the first of our February 19th presentations. Dave Bernard has been working with FoxPro in various forms since 1990 (ver 1.02). He has 25 years of sofware development, management and executive experience in may different industries. He currently works on a mix of web development and database projects. He is experienced in many areas such as SQL Server, DHTML, JavaScript, VBScript, ASP, CSS, COM+, MSMQ, XML, XSL. Dave is also the owner of Dave Bernard Consulting and co-owner of Overge, Inc.. Using SQL Server 2000, Dave Bernard will create and demonstrate several examples of stored procedures and user-defined functions. Then, show code examples of setting up a connection to the database from FoxPro, executing stored procedures from FoxPro and utilizing the stored procedure result set in FoxPro. [Click HERE to link into Dave's presentation!]
Topic 2 :: "Linux as a Desktop OS" AFUG is pleased to announce that Kevin Cully will be making the second of our February 19th presentations. Kevin Cully is owner of CULLY Technologies, LLC that designs websites, creates database applications, conducts training and presentations. Cully Technologies, LLC has been in existence since 2000, and since that time, he has concentrated on building web sites, web applications, and fat client applications in a variety of commercial industries. Kevin has been programming in FoxPro since FoxPro 2.0 for DOS in 1992 and has been programming using the Web Connection framework since 1997. Kevin Cully will be demonstrating Linux as a desktop operating system. He will be taking a frank and (mostly) balanced look at the Linux operating system, pointing out its strengths and weaknesses, how it compares to Windows, what productivity software is available, and how that productivity software matches up to the offerings available on Windows. He will also be discussing the issues of which distribution of Linux to choose, how they differ from one another, cost and licenses. If there is time remaining, Kevin will touch on the availability of Open Source databases such as MySQL and PostgreSQL. [Click HERE to link into Kevin's presentation follow up document!]
"Database Design" and "Data Warehousing" AFUG is pleased to announce that Maurice Frank will be making our January 15th presentation. Maurice Frank is a Managing Consultant for IBM Global Services where he specializes in Business Intelligence and data warehousing. Maurice was also the founder of the Atlanta FoxPro Users Group when it started as a SIG of ADBUS, the Atlanta Database Users Society. He has also spoken at FoxPro Devcons and has written articles for FoxPro publications. He later became Editor-in-Chief of DBMS Magazine (now Intelligent Enterprise). If you design tables, then you must understand good relational database design, even while you craft the most modern object-oriented applications that use XML to implement web services accessible by web-enabled cell phones on another planet. Maurice Frank will discuss the timeless techniques for sound database design. Learn how to review a database design you inherit from another developer. See the mistakes seemingly savvy designers can make with concepts as simple as keys. Experience the almost inevitable errors you will encounter that violate the simplest rules of good database design. And most importantly, learn why and how to break the rules when that is warranted. As an added bonus, Maurice will diplomatically review your database design if you bring it to the meeting. ERwin 3.X or 4.X file format preferred.
"VFP 9 :: Europa" AFUG is pleased to announce that Y. Alan Griver, Microsoft Visual Studio Data Group Manager, Ken Levy's boss, and long-time member of the Fox community, will be our special guest speaker at our December meeting (which will be rescheduled to Monday, December 1st). YAG will be showing us what's up with VFP 9, code-named Europa. This will be a great opportunity to learn about the new features expected in Europa and Microsoft's outlook on VFP, in general. In addition to the AFUG meeting, we'll be meeting YAG for dinner prior to the regular meeting at 5:30 at one of the restaurants close to New Horizons. This gives us double the opportunity to discuss issues of interest.
"Marketing the FoxPro Community" and "Behind the Scenes: VFP Web/e-Commerce Sites" AFUG is pleased to announce that Jim Eddins will be making our November presentation. Jim Eddins is the founder of DBX Technologies (http://www.dbxtech.com) and FoxToolBox (http://www.foxtoolbox.com) and a long time supporter in the Foxpro community. In addition to discussing his efforts in marketing to the FoxPro community, primarily done via his business FoxToolBox, Jim will demonstrate some of the latest VFP 8.0 technologies as he uses them in a web/e-Commerce environment.
"Microsoft Certifications & GLGDW Recap" AFUG's own Vice President, Dave Bernard, has recently passed the MCSD and MCDBA certification exams. His presentation will be on certifications and will touch on resources, what to expect, costs, etc. For a copy of the presentation, please click here for the October 2003 AFUG Presentation - Microsoft Certifications In addition, he is going to give us a run-down on the sessions that he attended at the Great Lakes Great Database Workshop, which just completed this week. SeptAugust 21st, 2003 "MapPoint :: Serving maps and driving directions via a web application" Russell Cambell, President of Interthink, Inc., will be giving our presentation. Russell will be discussing web development issues and demonstrating a web app that is currently in development and is approaching release. The web application will show how Russel has recently used MapPoint to serve up maps and driving directions on a web site.
"ASP.NET"
Our speaker will by Mike Amundsen.
Mike
is a Deep Training instructor and founder of www.eraserver.net, a .NET hosting
company. An internationally known author and lecturer, Mike Amundsen travels
throughout the United States and Europe speaking and teaching on a wide range of
topics including .NET, the Internet, team development & leadership, and other
subjects. He has more than a dozen books to his credit. His most popular titles
are ASP.NET for Developers, Teach Yourself Database Programming with Visual
Basic in 21 Days, 3rd Ed., and Using Visual InterDev.
"Taking FoxPro Development to the Web" - Part 2
This month's meeting will take place on Thursday, June 19th at
7:00 (Informal discussion kicks off at 6:30 and that's when the free food will
arrive). This month's topic will be "Taking FoxPro Development to
the Web - Part 2". This will be an in-depth look at the coding
techniques and caveats behind real-world implementations of FoxPro on the
Internet. AFUG member Dave Bernard will be our presenter.
For a copy of the presentation click here:
Taking FoxPro to the Web
Thursday, May 15th, 2003 "Taking FoxPro Development to the Web" - Part 1 AFUG member Dave Bernard will be presenting an overview of what's involved in
taking an existing monolithic FoxPro application (just about any version) and
"moving" that to the Internet. Areas covered will include
Infrastructure Issues, Security Issues, Architecture Issues, Your New
Development Toolbox and demos of several live and in-progress example
implementations. April 17th, 2003 "Handling Graphics with VFP8, GDI+, and Web Connection" With VFP8, we now have some great new image handling tools. These abilities are made available via the GDI+ library available in WindowsXP, IE6.0, and via a free download. You can now display images of varying types including animated GIFs in the ImageControl. Additionally, you can rotate and flip images. This ability doesn't extend to the manipulation of actual graphics files, however. West-Wind Web Connect has introduced a new function set and a new wwImaging.dll library which allows for basic image handling for external graphic files. Rotating, flipping, cropping, thumbnailing, and converting images from one format to another are all abilities available to VFP developers and users of the Web Connect product. Kevin Cully of CULLY Technologies, LLC will be demonstrating the new abilities, their strengths and shortcomings at the April AFUG meeting. He will be demonstrating an application that he has developed designed to demonstrate the image handling capabilities including batch thumbnailing of images, generating HTML merging in the image information, and posting to a web site the new images and HTML via FTP. Code samples and a downloadable project (minus the WC classes) will be available to attendees. March 20th, 2003 "Stonefield Database Toolkit" The March presentation will focus on adding Stonefield Database Toolkit to an existing application and using the Reindex form to let the users reindex their tables. We'll also cover cover additional features of SDT and some general development techniques. Please note that we will be giving away a copy of SDT as a door prize, along with a free 6 month Premier Universal Thread membership, and one or two MS Press books. But you can't win if you don't attend. So please put this date on your calendar and bring an associate.
"Product review: Cryptor and ReFox" In February, we'll be looking at two packages from Xitech: Cryptor and ReFox. As their web site states, "Cryptor transparently and selectively encrypts / decrypts 'on the fly' by intercepting the data as it moves from the disk to the registered application and vice versa - so the data on the disk is always encrypted." The table, index, and memo field can be encrypted, as can other files (such as BMPs and JPGs). ReFox reconstructs source code by splitting an EXE or APP file into components and further decompiling the compiled modules .FXP (.FOX, .MPX, .SPX, .VCX etc.) producing custom formatted source code which is functionally the same as the original, including the names of variables and procedures. It also protects applications from unauthorized decompilation via its branding feature. January 16th, 2003 "Arnica WebPortal" Carl Olson, CEO of Cerelogic, Inc.,
will be giving our presentation. Cerelogic is a provider of asset management,
maintenance and repair operations (MRO), and service and repair management
software solutions. Carl will present a Visual FoxPro-based portal software
application developed by Arnica Software
Corporation. Cerelogic, Inc. chose to deploy their latest MRO
application at Delta Air Lines within the Arnica WebPortal. The need to
integrate and aggregate corporate information from multiple sources drove
Cerelogic's decision to use a web-based portal to deploy their enterprise MRO
software solutions. |
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