RE: [OT] Switching to Linux (was: Microsoft takes on ACT)

["Robert C. Leif" <rleif@rleif.com>]

From: Bob Leif
To: Marin David Condic et al.
I agree about reading my Ada Letters article. However, if someone is
motivated to do something, I will gladly send them a preprint. I agree,
"Its an interesting idea but it would be a lot of work to pull it all
together." Hopefully, it would be very profitable.

The creation of an XForms package that was bootstrapped using the
relevant parts of XSL and/or SVG would permit the development of an XML
based GUI. An Ada tool that creates a thick binding to a GUI, such as
Windows, could be morphed into an XML tool. It could even employ Adobe's
SVG browser plug-in. 

XMLSpy (www.xmlspy.com) sells for $399 and they claim that they have
525,710 users worldwide. That is just under $210 million. Obviously, not
all of XMLSpy's users paid retail. However, I suspect that their gross
is pretty good compared to the overall Ada market. XMLSpy, as of yet,
can not do XForms. The use of Ada should provide a significant
competitive advantage over C based languages.

-----Original Message-----
From: comp.lang.ada-admin@ada.eu.org
[mailto:comp.lang.ada-admin@ada.eu.org] On Behalf Of Marin David Condic
Sent: Thursday, May 30, 2002 6:25 AM
To: comp.lang.ada@ada.eu.org
Subject: Re: [OT] Switching to Linux (was: Microsoft takes on ACT)

I have not looked at this extensively, but there are a couple of things
that
might apply. XUL is a XML based markup language that aims at describing
user
interfaces. I think XForms is something similar - but I don't think
these
are highly solidified yet.

The basic idea here would be to have *some* (TBD) XML based markup
language
that described the GUI. (Note that GtkAda does this) When the GUI is
interacted with, data could be returned to the application in some
XML-based
format. (I think Bob Leif sees a strong correlation between the kinds of
data descriptions possible in XML and Ada so it would be fairly
straightforward to line up data coming out of XML and into Ada
structures.
But I wouldn't want to presume to speak for Bob - read his Ada Letters
article.)

So it would be possible to envision an  Ada GUI building scenario that
had
XML for the markup of the GUI (enabling the possible use of all sorts of
off-the-shelf tools) and XML for the transfer of data between the GUI
engine
and the Ada application. This would give you platform independent GUI
capabilities and the possibility of having applications easily operate
on a
client/server model. (The GUI-driving engine need not be on the same
platform as the back-end Ada application - they just need to transfer
XML
between each other.)

Its an interesting idea but it would be a lot of work to pull it all
together.

MDC
--
Marin David Condic
Senior Software Engineer
Pace Micro Technology Americas    www.pacemicro.com
Enabling the digital revolution
e-Mail:    marin.condic@pacemicro.com


"chris.danx" <spamoff.danx@ntlworld.com> wrote in message
news:pUcJ8.1671$D3.149718@news8-gui.server.ntli.net...
>
> Can you provide some details of XML guis or your thoughts? (or are
they a
> secret, incase someone rips off your ideas?)  This has popped up once
or
> twice here in the past, but there hasn't been much debate or indeed
provided
> information on the marrying of XML and a GUI.
>
>