Possible New User to Alpha 5 Looking for Opinions/Answers

[mike_bmo]

I work at a Trust Company in back office operations.
We’re currently researching RAD development environments for our internal (and maybe external ) users.
By far most of our applications are in Microsoft Access. We’d like to eventually move those to a new environment as well.
We get most of our files from our data provider early in the morning and upload them to a MS SQL Server via SSIS. The applications we have generally involve either looking at datasets from this data, then creating batch files, or comparing them to files we receive from outsourcing customers or other third parties.

I’ve been working with the trial version of alpha 5 for a couple of weeks. My focus has been on the Web Projects.

My questions are geared towards long time users of Alpha 5. In general does it sound like a good solution for what we do? Especially in terms of importing/exporting small temporary daily files. Does anyone use the web projects for these types of operations? Do users recommend using another application web page design like Dreamweaver?

Also, what do most long time users like about Alpha 5 (what does it do well or best)? And if starting over would they choose it.
Thanks in advance to anyone who answers.

[Steve Workings]

A lot of people are coming to A5 to replace Access apps. Faster, better on the web side, great set of tools.

I've been on the other side of the bank wall - working with customers who send you those files, receive 'em back for processing (ACH batches) etc. There's no software challenge here -- A5 easily has everything you need.

1000 reasons why A5 is better; been using it since 1989 I think and never wish for anything else. I know I speak for everyone on this board (which itself is one of the great A5 features in fact!) in welcoming you to A5. Let us know how we can make you a permanent part of the community.

[DaveM]

Mike,

Welcome to alpha. I have been with alpha since about 1987(I think). Have used and worked with access as a "Have to" a few times and found nothing that excited me less after using the alpha product. The alpha product is growing in ability and functionality rapidly where access is not and has not for some time now.

I do mainly desktop, but there are many here that only do the web side and some that do both. The two can be used together as needed.

What you want to do is very doable and as you go along, you will find yourself expanding way beyond anything you thought you could do with access.

Use this board! People here will give you all the help and later you can give back to someone else.

[gilbertro]

I would like to join in and trumpet Steve and Dave's reply.
I have been using Alpha Five for a few years now and have used it in large Insurance packages, Warehouse Operations/Management, Medical Applications and a few small web apps.

I have not come across anything yet that Alpha Five cannot do. We have used it in my company to accomplish all types of tasks in the shortest time imaginable.
I think its modular approach and built in functionality such as User/Group security, reporting, export/import/uploading of external files, graphing, mapping, imaging help to make the life of a developer easier.

In my opinion I would say it is 4 times faster than developing in .NET (although one of my die hard .NET developer says Alpha is only 2.5 times faster)
You see I don't have much time to waste because time is money. We need to have the ability to carry several projects at the same time with less staff and so that is where Alpha Five comes in. The support staff is more than competent and you will be well taken care of.

Mike, This product is amazing. Come on in and get your feet wet !

[Paullm]

Welcome aboard, Mike!

Not my place to ask, but I will, regardless …

IF you do go with A5 and it does all that you need it for … and IF you are very happy with the product, IF your employers permit it … PLEASE consider allowing Alpha Software to do a Case Study on your application of A5. (The case study could be generic enough so that you are not giving away anything proprietary).

Unfortunately, there is a severe dearth of A5 Case Studies re: IDENTIFIED major users, which hinders consideration/adoption of the software by other large (or “highly-regulated”) entities.

A5 is certainly up to your task. It’s a great product with great support, but getting that word out and building sufficient industry awareness has always appeared to be a weakness of AS.

[Steve Wood]

I have the same love for Alpha as described below and have been using it since 2005 (almost all Web). One of the things I like about Alpha is the intuitive tools for SQL-based apps. I was an SQL novice when I started, but now build everything using SQL. I could not have done that if Alpha did not have effective tools to manage SQL data, build views, relationships, etc. from inside Alpha. Another thing you will notice is we have a very active user's forum with a lot of highly motivated users; that comes in handy when you start your first project.

Regarding your questions: you can continue to load new data directly into your SQL Server via SSIS. You can prepare attractive views for your clients using grids and dialogs. If needed, you can write program script of any length or complexity to do your data comparisons. The results of your compare can be shoved back in to your database, or whatever you require.

You can search for many existing applications here: http://www.alphadevnet.com/greatapps.a5w

[Richard Rabins]

More examples are shown here

One of the examples on this page is an award winning insurance application built by a 39,000 person insurance company

There are MANY other examples -one of the challenges is that many of our customers don't want to go public on their Alpha Five apps because they have told us that they see Alpha Five as a weapon that gives them a competitive advantage and they don't want to tip off their competition.

[Ezslim]

Our company has been doing all of our development work exclusively in A5 since 2007.

Our clients range from small to very large (+$2.5 billion in annual sales) in many different industries including Retail, Engineering, Insurance, Food Service, Consumer Services, Insulation, Finance, and others. You name it and we've probably done work for a company in that industry.

The applications that we build typically use SQL on the backend and A5 web applications on the front end. However, we've developed automated scripts that import data into the database, extract data from the database, call webservices to receive XML data, interface with accounting systems, send emails, and quite a few other functions!

In our humble opinion, A5 is one of the best, if not THE best, modern day software development toolset.

The extremely responsive technical support and this message board are very valuable assets, as well.

Scott Lines
Partner, Web App Express, LTD

[DW0905]

Just to give you more re-assurance Mike, I work for a Healthcare Insurance company in the UK. We have been using Alpha for over 3 years now, and have found it to be an extremely flexible development tool. It is far faster to develop using Alpha 5 than using traditional web development languages, and we have even won an industry award for our on-line Broker Administration System written entirely in Alpha using SQL Server as the database. I am sure that you will find that it will meet all your needs, and more.
My own thoughts on why I would recommend Alpha 5; its an all in one tool - including an excellent report designer, has access to multiple industry standard databases, can be used to develop for the browser, desktop, and soon mobile devices (up and coming release V12), is easy to learn for existing programmers with very little browser development experience, plus it is extremely fast for prototyping and getting the final solution delivered to the business on time. I hope that reassures you.

[Bill Griffin]

I have been using a5 since version 7. I started out using it for a charity I was involved with to organize a golf outing. I since started using at work to present data from legacy systems. Each version has become progressively better and feature rich. I am now using A5 as my go to development tool when I need something quick and I know will work. I have been able to "extend" the use of many systems that we have, which have sql back-ends. I am looking forward to the mobile tools of V12 to use for some warehouse apps I need to create. It is truly amazing the things you can do out of the box. Knowing Xbasic and Javascript certainly help extend Alpha's power, but for the most part, using the tools Alpha provides is all I need. Once you dive in, it's hard not to become addicted....

[Dezza]

Welcome to the A5 community Mike,

The guys are spot on… Alpha Five will be able to do the job, no questions about that. I’ve had Alpha Five for a good eight years now and over this time it’s become not only more powerful, but much easier to use for programmers and non-programmers alike.

I personally like being able to control my data and quickly and easily whip up a web project the way I want it to look and work, without being restricted to a ‘template’ solution… and then be able to easily implement a web security framework, all managed through Alpha Five.

[datawiz]

Welcome Mike,

My work requires me to spend most of my time in the MS SQL environment as we have more than 20 Servers/Instances of SQL. We are very data intensive and have found that the partnership between SQL and ALPHA is one that cannot be matched by any other. I maintain this environment mostly by myself and I needed a tool that would complement MS SQL. I had come from a VB background and had certainly understood the limitations and abilities of the product. After doing some research I eventually choose ALPHA.
ALPHA helps us to better manage and integrate information with our various vendors. I am frequently asked by our business partners how I am able to successfully complete projects on time and with little resources. I just tell them that I have a cape with the letter "A" on it. Again, ALPHA + SQL = A Multitude of Possibilities.

Good Luck!

[Jeff Benson]

Hi Mike -

I've been using Alpha products for over 25 years for application development and they have always provided the tools and environment needed to get jobs done quickly and efficiently. Alpha Five v11 is an amazing product packed with powerful features that make web-based development easy, yet versatile. And Alpha is engaged in continuously improving the product (even between major releases) with new features and capabilities.

I believe Alpha Five's backend integration with SQL Server and xBasic scripting language would perfectly suit your data import/export and analysis needs. Alpha Five's web components make building a web-based presentation layer for your applications a breeze. Most of the apps I build are data-driven (which is where Alpha excels) and Alpha's CSS and web-page styling support is sufficient that I don't need a product like Dreamweaver.

[gregz]

Mike,
I've been using Alpha software since 1993. We use Alpha 5 V11 for prorcessing over 2,000,000 transactions per year totaling over $500,000,000.00. We use SSIS and MS SQL for 80% of our databases.
Alpha 5 V11 is one of the fastest development tools for in-house applications and public facing apps.
V12 will make it very easy to implment mobile apps.
I hope this info helps...

[Paullm]

Memo To Alpha Software:

If you remove the references to Mike in the above posts, you are looking at some of the best A5 testimonials available! This is real meat!

The problem with the existing A5 Testimonial page, is that all the content is anonymous, so it lacks credibility. The comments are verbatim (which I don't doubt), but ... verbatim by who?

As an avid student and subscriber of [marketing gurus] Dan Kennedy, Jay Abraham and Joe Polish/Dean Jackson (ILoveMarketing.com) a blind testimonial does not have much real value. It looks contrived.

[Jay Talbott]

Mike,
Anything I write will probably appear to come from the Department of Redundancy Department.
I have been using Alpha since 1993, and make my living exclusively from the product.
You will not be disappointed in its ease-of-use, Rapid Application Development capability, excellent ability to work with SQL tables, and the wonderful support of not only this board, but the staff of Alpha.
Keep watching for a new video series for users moving from Access to Alpha. It should be available soon.
Jay Talbott

[leehaddox]

I am a contract programmer, and have used many tools over the last 14 years to develop systems, both desktop and web. Although I still use some of those tools today, I use Alpha 5 more than the others.

I have found that I can develop apps in it quicker than any of the other languages that I use. I primarily develop web apps with Alpha, and I haven't found anything that I can't accomplish. I have had to change my approach or mindset on a few items from what I would do in other languages, but the more I use Alpha the more I like it. I have developed more than a dozen complete systems with it, and made changes/enhancements to others over the last 1.5 years, and look forward to the next release and the ability to create mobile apps.

[DaveM]

From Richard:

There are MANY other examples -one of the challenges is that many of our customers don't want to go public on their Alpha Five apps because they have told us that they see Alpha Five as a weapon that gives them a competitive advantage and they don't want to tip off their competition.

Richard is correct about this. I do not want alpha software to show in my apps for fear that my competition will pick it up and start doing as well as I do in getting apps out the door quicker and better. Most of my competitors are on vb and an access mdb file for their apps. When they go to a Dealer's site, they are very interested in what that dealer uses for a tool and the dealers tend to be proud and they show it to them. Dealers also tend to brag about how quickly they get what they need after they sign on a new bank or they need a certain new report at how fast they get it in-house to use. I can make an app, debug, add features, make specific reports in a fraction of the time my competition can. There is no degredation of speed for alpha and in most cases alpha performs much faster. I use dbf and on the desktop. As I posted in another thread, alpha can(with my udf's) compute a payment on a car loan much quicker than any of my know competition. That is very heavy math. Rolling a payment, apr, down payment, trade value, etc are as much as 10 times faster using alpha.

[cFlat7]

In general does it sound like a good solution for what we do? Especially in terms of importing/exporting small temporary daily files. Does anyone use the web projects for these types of operations? Do users recommend using another application web page design like Dreamweaver?

Also, what do most long time users like about Alpha 5 (what does it do well or best)? And if starting over would they choose it.
Thanks in advance to anyone who answers.

I believe Alpha would be an good fit for what you are describing. Other tools would also work but Alpha will end up getting you to where you need to be quicker and with a more maintainable solution in the end. The thing Alpha does best is providing the infrastructure for building solid web-apps efficiently. You don't need to provide a myriad of details as with other development tools, yet it has the flexibility to allow you to customize things when you need to.

[DoronF]

Hi Mike,

I also moved to Alpha Five from Visual FoxPro and .Net. You want to see my article about my Journey until I found Alpha Five at: http://alphasoftware.net/from-visual...-five-via-net/

My firm also provides Database services as Remote DBA for MS SQL and performing the Import using SSIS is the right thing to do. Then you dump all the data into a grid. I suggest all data cleanup should be done in the database level.

A grid includes a search engine and detail form and actual grid and all in one component. In addition you can basically impellent all of that without writing any code. Get use to idea that working with Alpha requires by far much less code then Visual FoxPro, .Net. or MS Access.

Alpha Five and MS SQL is a great combination for productivity. My first application was a Student Loan application and using Alpha Five really shorten the duration of the entire development. I started with Alpha a year and 3 months ago.

I liked also the Report Engine that Alpha Five has, and and it is very powerful and very flexible.

Regards,

Doron
The Farber Consulting Group, Inc.

Web site: http://www.dFarber.com
Blog: http://www.dfarber.com/computer-consulting-blog.aspx
Alpha Five Software Developer
Convert Ms Access to Web

[michaeldarby]

Hi Mike, I've been using Alpha Five against MSSQL for about 3 years and have only ever used it for Web and Mobile Development. In regard to your specific requirement, we also use SSIS to import data from wholesalers/distributors of our products, and merge it together with direct sales. Just one of our uses for Alpha Five is to provide dashboarding and analysis/reporting tools to make that data (millions of rows) available to our deskbound and mobile staff. All of our datasets can be output to CSV or Excel using Alpha Five. The neat thing about Alpha Five is whatever web based solutions you build for the desktop should also work fine in the web browser on mobile devices.

We've also been doing quite a bit of work with the current beta release of Alpha Five (or Alpha Anywhere), and that really adds some nice additional tools both for traditional web apps and mobile devices. The Panel model they have developed lends itself very nicely to Web Apps too, and the new List control can render thousands of rows of data within seconds, which is also of great benefit to our web based applications. At the moment we have a portion of our mobile workforce running live using iPad's on the beta version of Alpha Five, and I can say without hesitation that it is a very significant improvement in terms of both native look and feel and performance on that device.

I have many toolsets available and for Web or Mobile based solutions I still choose Alpha Five. As others have suggested, Alpha Five is extremely flexible, has a very extensive development language, and you can keep using your SQL Views, Stored Procs and SSIS packages where it makes sense.

Hope this helps.

[DoronF]

Hi Mike,

I also moved to Alpha Five from Visual FoxPro and .Net. You want to see my article about my Journey until I found Alpha Five at: http://alphasoftware.net/from-visual...-five-via-net/

My firm also provides Database services as Remote DBA for MS SQL and performing the Import using SSIS is the right thing to do. Then you dump all the data into a grid. I suggest all data cleanup should be done in the database level.

A grid includes a search engine and detail form actual grid and all in one component. In addition you can basically implement all of that without writing any code. Get use to idea that working with Alpha requires by far much less code then Visual FoxPro or .Net. or MS Access.

Alpha Five and MS SQL is a great combination for productivity. My first application was a Student Loan application and using Alpha Five really shorten the duration for the entire development. I started with Alpha a year and 3 months ago.

I liked also the Report Engine that Alpha Five has, and it is very powerful and very flexible.

Regards,

Doron
The Farber Consulting Group, Inc.

Doron

Web site: http://www.dFarber.com
Blog: http://www.dfarber.com/computer-consulting-blog.aspx
Alpha Five Developer
Convert MS Access to Web

[dionmccormick]

My questions are geared towards long time users of Alpha 5. In general does it sound like a good solution for what we do? Especially in terms of importing/exporting small temporary daily files. Does anyone use the web projects for these types of operations?

There are some amazing back end tools built into the Alpha Five application server. I am using them on a couple of projects. It allows you to automate back end update processes using files. Once it is set up, it works beautifully.

Because Alpha came from a desktop development world, there are an amazing amount of file oriented functions built into the system. These can be tapped on the server side to make the kind of process you are talking about simple to implement and manage. And the logging that is included in the application server makes it easy to monitor and adjust the processes.

[kkfin]

Relax boys!

Enough is enough.

[Jay Talbott]

Wait, we are not through gushing.
Jay

[kkfin]

This man I trust but this thread is suspicious.

[benne30]

Happy to add another positive reply to this thread! Very happy Alpha Five users, developing sophisticated web apps for all sorts of businesses. We've even got a video to prove it! See http://start-software.com/software-d...rder-tracking/

[pulsoft]

[peteconway]

What a great Video - just what I needed. - Make the jump you won't be disappointed with Alpha - the 12 months has really seen it shine. We have a Global app in the SAS area coming out soon and its amazing what we have done. Again - funny video.

[Paullm]

Attn: Doron

Just an observation ... you may have moved from Visual FoxPro to Alpha Five, but your website does not appear to even mention Alpha Five.