In my project i have used WPF and am following MVVM pattern. So i have a report module in my project and the reports are just plain reports. So i would like to know should i use SQL Reporting Service 2005 to create reports and then use report viewer as client or should i go for WPf Fixed Document Control- Document viewer.
Can anyone please tell me which of these will be easier to integrate with my project.
Please reply
Thanks
Sharath
WPF Document (Fixed or Flow)
Pros:
Easier to integrate. All is included in regular WPF
Native
More control on the output
Cons:
Must program a lot for a multi-page report
Must program a lot for headers, footes, groups, etc.
SQL Reporting Services
Pros:
Mature tools
Interoperable with other solutions (IE asp.net)
Groups, totals, page headers, graphics built in
Cons:
Not native, must use a embedded windows form control
Must deploy the reporting service runtime separately (not good for click-once apps)
Hard to integrate to your business objects
Related
I have a SQL Server Database back-end. I want an internal network front-end UI, such that it is only accessible within a company network, not the web. Which platform would be best to use for a front-end UI application with a SQL Server database back-end? ASP.NET, PHP, Silverlight, or something else.
I would like to have graphs showing trends in data, and I would like to have the user to be able to select paramters on certain reports.
I do not have much experience with front-end user interfaces so I am open to just about anything.
If you need more information just let me know.
Thanks
If you want to build a front-end mainly for reports , I would suggest using SQL Server Reporting Services.
If you are really interested in having a better UI experience then i suggest you go with Silverlight .You wont get resizable layout ,grid and feature rich UI without using 3rd party tools in ASP.NET.
If you want your application to be used on any device than ASP.NET is the way to go since silverlight has some compatibility issue as you need to install plugin for it .So it all depends upon the requirement .No idea regarding PHP or any other technology
We're a small software company, developing projects for manufacturing facilities about analysis, traceability, reporting etc. We're using Access for front end, SQL Server for back end. We've quite big customers too and our company is growing. So far it is working fine but I wonder should we move to more influential technologies, such as web based solutions. What do you think about the future of Access?
Well, keep in mind that Access now has a web option. This option works with SharePoint and the new upcoming office 365. Here is a video of an Access application and note how at the half way point I switch to running the application 100% in a web browser. No ActiveX or Silverlight is required. I even tested and run the application on my iPad.
Video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AU4mH0jPntI
And Access 2010 also has baked in support for the Azure (cloud) edition of SQL server.
So, we have web based options, cloud based options, and there been significant investments into Access for 2010.
You could have a look at these questions:
MS Access as Enterprise Software?
and
What are the appropriate uses for MS Access?
Here we have a central SQL Server database, with both an MS-Access and a Web client interface. MS-Access is history (we started it 5 years ago) and Web is trendy (less than one year old). I must admit that MS Access is still very very efficient and cheap, once you have resolved some MS access specific problems, to which you might find answers here:
Working with multiple programmers on MS Access
How do you use version control with Access development?
Best way to test a MS Access application?
MS-Access, VBA and error handling
You can always use VB.NET Express. It's free, and Microsoft's licensing should still allow you to sell apps created with it (they did with Express 2005).
UPDATE: Access 2013 has better support for web apps than previous versions, and the apps use SQL Server or SQL Azure under the hood by default. So be sure to thoroughly evaluate the latest version of Access before concluding that you need something else.
A very good alternative to Access with similar features is Lightswitch. Here's a quote from MSDN:
Visual Studio LightSwitch is a development environment designed to simplify and shorten the development of businesses applications and data services. LightSwitch makes it easy to create data-centric business applications that can consume a variety of data sources and create clients that can run on a variety of devices.
While Access now has a web option as #AlbertDKallal mentioned (and which is still worth considering as one option), creating an HTML 5 app is the whole focus of Lightswitch. (Note: the original version of Lightswitch required Silverlight, but the newer versions create HTML5 apps that don't require any plugins.) The app will also be more extensible, since it's a .NET app, and for things that require custom programming you can program in C# or Visual Basic rather than VBA.
I should mention at this point that I haven't actually tried Lightswitch yet (!) - I'm currently evaluating it and these are the features that look attractive to me compared to Access. If anyone reading this in the future is curious about what my experience with it was like, feel free to write a comment to remind me.
For some introductory info, see these links:
Showcase Video
Is Visual Studio LightSwitch the New Access?
(Note that this article is about a the original version of LightSwitch, not the latest version.)
And...for a completely different cloud-based option, check out:
https://www.parasql.com/
I am in the process of recommending an UI automation tool for a windows based WPF application in a company
Which targets wide range of customers . The Application lives on a layer of WCF services for getting
The data. The company is already having a small VBScript framework written specifically for Test Complete
and is really not robust, Hence I am lookout for a right tool, where we could reuse the scripts or
Improve the already existing tool. Any ideas are welcome.
I have looked at Microsoft UI Automation, Project White, UIA Verify and Ranorex. Each one of them
Is having a feature lack.
I was able to go through the process of Microsoft UI Automation. I am still in the process of understanding how it works
with WPF, since it is totally dependent on Automation IDS.
Our application is huge and is not written with this in mind. All the code either does not implement
Automation ID property or Name property which is very much essential for object identification in the visual tree
in tools like UISpy and VisualUIAVerify.
What I am looking in specific are the following. Please give ratings to each of these
1) Recording : Recording , play back and automatic execution of test scripts and generate a report.
2) Dependencies : Minimal Dependencies(.NET frameworks, API modules , SDK Versions etc..)
3) )Code Generation : Code Generation of test scripts from Templates, Macros and Recording.
4)Object Name Mapping: Avoid explicit usage of Automation IDS and screen corrdinates, if they use, does it support any tools which would take XAML Files and insert Automation IDS into it and also avoid Problems With duplicate Automation IDS.
5) Events: Any Events and call backs that the user(tester) may receive if the GUI has undergone any changes
and how the scripts would change in this Case.
6) Support : Support for different scripting languages and easy Code conversions(C#, VBScript, Python.. etc)
7) Fast and Reliable: Easy and fast accessibility of GUI elements for manipulation( Like support to xml dom, Json.. etc), navigation, code duplication replacement tasks for changes in UI and easy configuration(xml, ini files)
8)Code Converters: the tester writes code in vbscript and developer could simply convert it into c# for embedding them into any stand alone framework if need be).
9)Custom controls: Support for custom controls and object mapping. If you have a custom object that behaves like one of standard controls. are you able to map (tell the test tool that the custom control behaves like the standard) control? Does it support all the standard controls methods? Can you add the custom control to it’s own class of control?
10)Reports: Should be able to execute multiple tests at once and generate a report similar to VisualUIAVerify.
Visual Studio 2010 Coded UI Tests
You can use Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate or Visual Studio 2010 Premium to create automated tests of the user interface known as coded UI tests. These tests provide functional testing of the user interface and validation of user interface controls.
I am using Coded UI Tests to automate tests of a WPF application built on the MVVM pattern. The record/playback features of the tool are impressive, generating really nice models. For large suites, the advice is to tear apart the generated code, structuring and extending it for your own purposes.
I recommend Visual UIA Verify to assist viewing the automation structure of your application while developing and debugging.
Have you tried AutomatedQA testcomplete
http://www.automatedqa.com/products/testcomplete/
Is it possible to build a good medium to full sized application using just silverlight as a host?
A few things that would be needed:
- dynamic pages (one silverlight "screen" can switch between screens, like a normal app.
- similar to a java applet which launches from the browser
I see that Telerik sells RadControls for WPF...but this is only useful (to me) if Silverlight can be a rich client platform through the web.
Although still a somewhat immature platform, Silverlight 2.0 supports many of the features that I would expect from a platform needed to create full sized applications.
Data access through web services and local data/object query support with Linq
Many feature rich controls such as datagrid, treeview, etc
A very usable subset of the CLR (common language runtime)
Access to restricted local storage on the client machine
It is cross platform
There are already some great add-ons, like Telerik and the Silverlight Control Toolkit
For your specific scenario, Microsoft has published a tutorial on Multi-page Applications
Absolutely. I've been looking into this and believe that it's as easy to do in Silverlight as it is in any other language. Remember that Silverlight 2 uses C# 3.0 and from that you can build anything that's not included in the Silverlight version of the CLR. Also, the fact that Microsoft gives you access to the .NET source code means that you can compile the missing parts of the .NET libraries with your application. (No idea about the licensing issues with that though.)
I've seen a presentation of a full featured CRM application two days ago. Although it's still alpha: It looks and feels like any office application. I don't know details but for me it's a proof of concept.
I am writing an applicaton that will be a standalone WPF application and also a cut down version that will work as Silverlight and so be hosted in browsers. I want the Silverlight application to access data from the cloud. The WPF application needs to work against a local database but then be able to sync with the same cloud storage.
So I need the following scenarios to work. Silverlight works directly against the data stored in the cloud. The WPF app works against a local database. But the WPF app has the ability when it starts up to go to the cloud and get the latest version in case of changes being made online since the last time the WPF app was run. When the user finishes on the WPF app it can then sync up the changes made to the cloud again. This allows better performance during WPF being run and also allows you to run it offline and sync up later when you have a connection.
What is the best technology available to do this? I know there is a Sync Framework, SQL Server Data Service, ADO.NET Entity Framework and SQL Server Compact Edition that help with data access but I am not sure if they can be made to work together to do the presented scenario.
Do I implement all this myself? Does most of it come for free and I only need to handle the syncing? If you have deep knowledge of the Microsoft data access technologies then I would appreciate your input on the design.
Your scenario would be easy with a standard SQL server backend. :)
However, I think what you're proposing is doable for the most part. For the WPF app and syncing to the cloud with SSDS you could use Project Huron (which has downloads coming "soon"). That would keep your SSDS data in sync with the WPF client apps.
For the silverlight side you could use the REST api of SSDS (or a helper library like SSDS Rest).
So you won't need to implement most of it yourself, but whenever you head down a road like this one there are always lots of little roadblocks to run into along the way. Have fun!