Feed: Latest news for dbQwikSite, dbQwikEdit, dbQwikSync, dbQwikReport - AggScore: 48.9

DW Query Builder V1 Released

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Just released DW Query Builder v1.0. As it's name suggests DW Query Builder is a visual query builder for dreamweaver. It is a dreamweaver extension that lets you create complex SQL statements with ease by representing your tables as boxes that you link to each other and then tick the columns you want to include in your data set. This extension integrated directly into dreamweaver and lets you create record sets for ASP and PHP.

More information and trial version can be found here.... http://www.thedevshoponline.com/dwQueryBuilder/

For those wishing to purchase QW Query Builder the price is $49.95 USD.

New Support and Forum

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dbQwik users now have a new support ticket system and integrated forum to help them get better support. Focus Technology (formerly TheDevShop)is trialing ZenDesk as a new support platform after experiencing some difficulties with the legacy systems.
ZenDesk is a rich support environment and we hope that it will fit the bill. Data is not being ported at this time as the legacy systems remain online and are in need of a major clean up as much of the information is outdated.

Do give the new system a try and let us know if this works better for you.

dbQwikSite Version 6 Released

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All new major release of dbQwikSite website designer and code generator is now available for download.
This new release includes many enhancements with special emphasis on generating websites that offer richer user experiences.

IDE Enhancements:

Live Preview Highly integrated design and testing. See your pages live as you design them. Live preview embeds a browser into dbQwikSite, so you can see not only how your pages look, but how they work as well. Live preview also interprets all your custom code so features implemented in custom code and via plugins are visible. Test and design at the same time.

Build more Powerful Pages:

Active plug-ins Active plug-ins are a whole new type of plug-in for dbQwikSite. Technically speaking these plug-ins are intelligent “auto snippets”. What they do is offer little bits of functionality to add to your pages. Many of the V6 new features are, in fact, active plug-ins.

Multiple Categories Category filtering has been one of our most popular features allowing your visitors to get lists filtered by a category. Now, we’ve gone one better, multiple categories. Filter by category then sub-category, and sub-sub-category and so on, all with never leaving the data list page.

Group Actions on List Page Ever want to make a page where users can tick, tick, tick several items and perform an action against the selected items? Now you can. Use standard actions, such as delete, or update a field or write your own actions in developer edition. Supercharge your repetitive action tasks with Group Actions.

In-line Add/Update/Delete Want to let your users work with records of their list page without navigating in and out add/update pages? In-line delete has now two new friends, in-line add and in-line update. Add and update forms can now be presented as pop-up dialogs rather than separate pages, to make working off the list page easier than ever.

Unbound Forms Do you have the need to collect information from your site using HTML forms, but you really do not need to store it in a database? New Unbound forms let you design forms that email you the user input rather than storing in a database table. It’s a fast way to create simple web forms.

Email Added / Edited Records Do you need to know when a new record is added or updated in your database? Now you can have dbQwikSite forms automatically send you a copy of the updates that take place on your web site.

Capcha Stop those pesky hackers and robots from submitting your forms, add Captcha to your forms. Capcha is the system where graphics are displayed, containing letters to type in before a form can be submitted..

Autocomplete Create input controls that look up values from your database as you type, allowing users to find existing values without scrolling trough long drop down lists. Unlike drop down lists, auto complete allow users to enter their own values when the value they seek is not already in the database.

RTF Editor You can now turn any text box control into an advanced RTF editor. Users can create formatted text to be stored and displayed from your database.

Quick Search Add s simple search right to your data list pages. Visitors can pick a field and filter by a value without needing to go to the search page.

Multiple Value Search Need to search for a shirt that is either red or blue or black? V6 now offers the ability to search for multiple search values in a single database column.

PDF Print via Online services Do your visitors ask for PDF copies of the pages they see on your site? Now you can simply add a Print PDF button to any page which sends that page to a free PDF document creation service.


XML and JSON Services. Now you can turn any dbQwikSite data page into a web service serving either XML or JSON data streams. There’s nothing to do other than call your page with a special URL parameter: return=XML or return=JSON.

Build Pages with More Pizzazz:

Custom Form Layouts Full support for custom layouts of Add and Update pages. Create professional looking form designs placing input field prompts and input field controls where ever you want them, add in borders and any HTML formatting and your forms will impress.

HTML Zones let’s you add “stuff”Add HTML “stuff” into more places on your page. We’ve exposed the layout “quadrants” found in developer edition to all editions. Previously, you could customize page headers and footers, as HTML segments. Now you have the same functionality for 10 separate zones arranged around the dbQwikSite generated content in a North, East, South, and West fashion.


Conditional Formatting Ever think that you’d like to change the format of data on your page based on the value of that data. For example show negative numbers in red, or bold any string that starts with “New “. Conditional formatting lets you do just that. You can control all CSS attributes of a data field based on the value contained in that field

Google Charts Who doesn’t like looking at graphs to visual their data? Whether it’s monthly sales or average rainfall, graphs inherently make numerical data easier to understand. dbQwikSite now seamlessly integrates to Google’s free (conditions apply) web service for creating graphs. No coding required, just pick the columns to graph and dbQwikSite does the rest.

Google & Live Maps Add maps to your web sites, with ease. Give point of a field in your data that is an address or a longitude / Latitude pair and add the power of interactive maps to your page.

Improved CSS dbQwikSite is great at making pages, hundreds of them a minute, all following the same formatting. Now you can gain greater control over the look of your pages, with new, more granular classes. Make your generated pages a truer reflection of your personal creativity.

Item level CSS controlEvery page item now lets you assign your own inline CSS attributes on both the caption and the data values. Now you can make certain fields stand out, and other fade out. Any CSS attributes are available down to the finest level of your page design.

Scrollable Data Areas Do wide tables and lots of data rows ruin your page, making it run off your monitor? Now you can easily constrain your tables into scrollable data areas, helping preserve the appearance of the your page design.

dbQwikSite 6.0 Beta Ready for Testing

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dbQwikSite V6 is on the way. As part of the release we are conducting a public Beta test where users can download the pre-release version and provide feedback to the development team about new features.

Anyone who wants to participate as a tester can download V6 BETA from the user forum
There is a thread available to record any issues and chat about new featured.

Official release dates for dbQwikSite production release is not available yet. The release date will depend on the outcome of the Beta test. We are targeting about 1 month for Beta testing.

dbQwikSite V6 is on its way

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Without a doubt the single most asked question I hear is: "When is version 6 coming?" The answer too often eludes me. But today I am happy to say... it's on the way.

After going through some staffing changes, version 6 took some hits in terms of both scope and delivery schedule. I have been avoiding answering that most prevalent question because, I just did not want to misguide our loyal user community. Amid all the forum rumors of the lack of delivery of new versions, I did not want to add to the confusion.

Truth be told we have been working on version 6 all along and it is shaping up for a release. Version 6 offers a range of new features that should make dbQwikSite generated web sites more powerful and flexible than ever before. The list is not yet finalized, as we try to squeeze in those last few features before freezing development to begin testing in earnest. V6 focus is on two areas, making pages more powerful for the end user and on design flexibility to allow designers greater control on the look of generated pages.

In the area of more powerful pages, look forward to: multiple categories, in-line edit/update, group actions against multiple selected records, new user controls, and enhanced search capabilities.

In the area of design you can expect to see: custom add/update form support, enhanced CSS classes, customizable HTML sections on all pages.

The above lists are not comprehensive, but should give you an idea of what to expect. As far as delivery dates, these will depend on testing results. Tomorrow is the date set to set the final scope and thus the development target deadline. After that some testing, and finally general release. It's hard to say exactly when these will occur, but stay tuned to this blog for news and updates.

Beyond V6. Many will note that V6 does not include true dot net code generation. That's because we wanted to do that right, and rather than shoehorning dot net functionality into the more classic paradigm of dbQwikSite generated pages, we decided to come out with an all-new version of dbQwikSite for dot net. That in no way infers that we are dropping PHP support. Quite the contrary, we are planning to migrate PHP into the same framework as the dot net product, leveraging a class oriented code generation in both languages. This will open new doors to PHP users, as well as Microsoft platform users who wish to extend and enhance dbQwikSite generated code.

dbQwikSite 5.4 Makes it a Joy to Deploy

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Oh Boy… another deploy!  This is what I always feel before trying to move a dbQwikSite database web site to a hosting server.  I’ve got to worry about file folders, file transfers, connection strings, data base installs, file permissions and none of it is as easy as I would like it to be. 

I’m not the only one that does not look forward to sorting out all the differences between my perfect PC test and some distant server looming out there in cyberspace.  Users have been asking for help deploying for quite some time now.  That time has arrived with the release of dbQwikSite version 5.4.  They say necessity is the mother of invention, I say laziness is a close second.  I therefore confess that my laziness is the driving force behind this most recent release.  “Just make it easy for me.” was the mandate I gave to the development team.  And about 6 weeks later I am happy to report that I can be lazy as I like and STILL get my site to deploy!

So what magic do we get in this version?  The Highlights are:  a new, smarter deploy wizard, a better more robust FTP, and on-line administrative pages.  The new deploy wizard now is smarter a producing working connection strings for your host.   The all new folder based file selection for deployment is a breeze to use.  Say “bye-bye” to dbQwikFTP, I doubt too many users will shed a tear over that.  Say “hello” to FileZilla (free open source) file transfer tool.   Simply put, it just works better than the now depreciated dbQwikFTP.  Smooth integration between the Deploy Wizard and FileZilla makes short work of file transfer; all I have to do is click the start the queue button and all my preselected folders are moved to the right place on my server.  A cool feature at the end of deploy, let’s me launch my site in my browser for easy testing.  One option is to launch the all new dbQwikSite “Site Admin” console.  Arriving in the console, I can install MySQL tables if I had generated the scripts, I can see what scripting languages are supported on my server, I can troubleshoot connection strings.   Neat, I think I like being lazy!  This version make it much more of “a joy to deploy” my sites.

 While the team worked hard to make sure I could be a real sloth, not every deployment task can be automated.  So to accompany all this new software wizardry is the infamous “missing deployment guide”.  It’s not missing anymore!  You can access the new on-line deployment guide from the either the “Help” or “dbQwikHosting” menus. 

There are other new features in 5.4 along with the regular batch of bug fixes.  Details can be found in the release notes.  Version 5.4 is a free upgrade for all version 5 users and is available via live-update.

Mashing it up with dbQwikSite

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What is a Mashup? For me it conjures up images of a bunch of cooks, all mashing away at a pot of boiled potatoes. But in the world of web development it means piecing together discreet units of available web functionality into a single integrated application.

Wikipedia defines a mash up as:

Mashup (web application hybrid)
In technology, a mashup is a web application that combines data from more than one source into a single integrated tool; an example is the use of cartographic data from Google Maps to add location information to real-estate data, thereby creating a new and distinct web service that was not originally provided by either source.

Before I say anything more let me show you are screen shot of something I was playing with in dbQwikSite before I looked up the term in Wikipedia.

Rave Review from Bangkok Post

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This Wednesday, then I opened my morning paper I was pleasantly surprised to find that Thailand's largest newspaper had done a review of dbQwikSite by their resident Web Design columnist. It's quite a positive review so I thought I would share it with you.
Read the full review here. (updated link Jun 9 2008)

Here are a few kudos from the article: (in the event that the above link gets "retired")

I do not normally get excited about a code generation tool but I have watched this local product evolve and it just keeps getting better.

Remember this is a local Thai product that rivals the bigger US equivalents and is of course a lot less expensive

If you are looking for a deceptively inexpensive web site builder and don't want to pay someone to build one for you then I recommend that you try dbQwikSite.

If you are wondering: No I'm not on the board or payroll - this is just a great product.

Smart XSL Snippets: Mini Code Generators

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Today we released dbQwikSite 5.3.0.3. By most counts, this is a simple maintenance release but hiding in the list of updates there appears one rather mundane looking item entitled “xsl snippet support”. Looks pretty small and simple on the surface, but this single new feature infers some pretty powerful implications. It means that you can make mini-code generators inside the dbQwikSite generation framework.

Let’s take a closer look at this feature. We call it XSL code snippets. What it means that in any of the 150-plus custom code insert points found in Developer Edition, you can write an XSL(T) template. But this is not a template transforming xml data to format HTML in the browser. These XSL templates work a code generation time and they work against the XML of your project. This is really cool, because it means that you can access all the design information stored in your project model to generate code snippets. It takes a bit of time to wrap your mind around the concept but once you do the implications are quite interesting.

Let’s step back a bit. Let’s say we are working with Developer edition, which in itself is very powerful. What we can do is add in new script code to enhance our generated pages. We can do all kinds of neat things by typing in “static” script syntax into insert points / events. Ok, so we can understand adding code snippets to our pages. But what about a “smart snippet”? One that can write the code snippet for you. One that can know about other pages in your project, one that can react to the design setting contained in your project model. That’s exactly what the XSL snippets offer. And when you think about it, that’s exactly what the dbQwikSite code generation engines does, translates your design setting to code. But what’s extra cool about the XSL snippets is that it is you who defines what is to be generated, rather than the code generation engine itself. Now, that’s pretty advanced flexibility, and you won’t find this type of power in any competing tool. If you are lucky you may get “events” and then only a handful at best. With dbQwikSite you get over 150 “events” and you get smart snippets that can actually generate code themselves.

So why would we ever write a smart snippet. There are a number of situations that make smart snippets indispensible. The first one that comes to mind is to be able to have code snippets that is “project aware”, for example you may want to create code that adds new page flows, but without the names of the other pages, you could not so this, smart snippets can gather information from the project XML. Another situation is to make a snippet that is settings aware, for example you want it to create code differently if the page is secured or not, or if the group has a shopping cart. These are examples where smart snippets can outperform their “static” counterparts. You can write snippets that are not project specific, they are generic and self adjusting between projects. Another example could be a multi-scripting language snippet. For example rather than writing two snippets, one in ASP and one PHP and maintaining, managing and distributing both snippets, you have only one smart snippet, that automatically detects the generation language and inserts the correct language syntax.

Granted, writing smart snippets may not be for everyone. You can get along quite well inserting ordinary “static” script code into your insert points. To write a smart snippet, you need an understanding of the project XML and XSL as well as the code that you want to generate. But if you are into these technologies, you may be interested in a few of the details of the mechanics of XSL smart snippets. To create a smart snippet, you do as you would for any other kind of code snippet. But instead of typing in script syntax you type in an XSL template, and check the box that says this is a XSL snippet. During code generation, your XSL is executed and the output is placed into the insert point that invokes the snippet. Your snippet is passed the entire DOM of project XML, as well as two parameters. The two parameters are the Page ID and the Item ID (when applicable), giving you the context of the call to your XSL. You can easily work your way through the DOM to access Groups, Pages and other project objects to produce the code syntax you need.

That’s it, one small item in a maintenance release, the gives you an extremely powerful capability, a capability that you won’t find elsewhere. And even if you are not up to writing your own smarts snippets others will write and share smart snippets and you can benefit. This is yet another way that we are providing ways for the user community to contribute to the development of dbQwikSite. With our first step about a year ago providing an XML project model, to support for user defined project reports, addition of a plug-in architecture, user definable payment processing page generation, code snippets and now smart snippets. You can look forward to dbQwikSite becoming more powerful and more flexible with every release.

Web Developer Edition Now Available

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dbQwikSite Developer Edition is now available for download. Developer Edition makes its debut as part of the release of 5.3. In a nutshell, Developer addition let’s you add your own custom code into your website projects. The concept is simple, but the ramifications are profound. It means that you can now extend and enhance your generated pages. Developer edition opens the door to a realm of possibilities.

I have been pushing for Developer Edition for almost a year now. I knew that I wanted it, I knew that it would be kewel (cool). What I didn’t know was exactly what it meant to web developers and web designers until I started testing it. It was like having my hands untied, or taking the rev limiter off your sports car. Now, I could do things that I had seen on other sites, but were beyond the capabilities of code generation.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the other editions of dbQwikSite, and every time I use them I am grateful that I don’t have to hand code thousands of lines of code. I always amazed what I can do in 10 minutes with this software. But, being the overachiever I am, I always want more! More features, more cool stuff, more flexibility. That’s exactly what I got with dbQwikSite Developer Edition. To date, I had to wait for the developers to have the time to code new features. I know from emails of our users that I am not the only one that wished that we could provide features faster. With Developer Edition, the game changed overnight. The only one that was holding back features was me, not the developers. I wanted graphs, I added graphs! I wanted conditional highlighting, I added conditional highlighting! I wanted a search on the data lists page, I added it! You get the idea, I am sure. It was instant gratification. It was the freedom to do much, much more without giving up all the “cushy” benefits of my beloved code generator.

Here is a copy of the promotional video I made to introduce Developer Edition.
The quality a bit blurry here, there is bigger one on the home page of dbQwikSite

If I have caught your interest, then you likely want to know more about what’s inside the new edition. Developer looks the same as other editions. What’s new is a “In-line code editor”. When you are working with a page, you click the “custom code” option in the popup menus. What you see is the generated source code. Inside the code, there are input boxes we call “insert points” in which you can type your own custom code. There are over 150 of these insert points at key places in the processing. Some are “events” like “after open dataset” and “on focus” of a control. Others do not related directly to an event, but more to places in code where you may want to add your own code, an example is “CSS Includes” it is not an event, but you may wish to include your own CSS files at this point in the source code. As you may have gathered, there are insert points for both client and server side scripting.

Besides the code editor, there are several reports designed specifically for web developer in mind edition such as the custom code report. You don’t need to hunt through each page looking for custom code in your project. Just run this handy report, and you’ll know exactly what custom code you have in your project. Another powerhouse feature is a complete custom code versioning mechanism built right into dbQwikSite. Every time you modify a custom code block, a new version is saved into your project. You can use the Version Management Interactive Report to view a complete history of your custom code blocks. What’s more, you can even “revert” back to previous versions if you discover you somehow messed things up along the way. Behind the scenes there have been some changes to the way pages are generated to allow better control of presentation by JavaScript. Ids are assigned to page elements; the contents of the page are now embedded in layout matrix of divs that let you insert content around generated elements. Variable name abstractions have been added to let you code using variable names that are readable and do not get changed when you do design changes.

If you want to give developer a try, you need the new executable program file. To get the most recent exe new users can download PE and existing users can run live update. All editions let you preview Developer’s entire user interface. If you want to test drive the code generation, just run in Full Trial mode. Upgrade pricing is available to all version 5 users. Details can be found on the web site.

Code Generators are Not Evil

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Recently I had someone ask me “I want to learn to make web sites. Tell, me honestly, if I buy your product, won’t it make me lazy?” I thought that was an interesting question. I combed the web and found several articles about how “real web coders” should not use code generators and that by using a code generator you will never develop the skills of a “real web developer”. I can appreciate some of the comments made in these blogs. But what strikes me as ironic is that these articles are reminiscent, of arguments made 30 years about the “evils” of high level programming languages such as COBOL and BASIC. I remember the arguments that if developers did not understand the assembly code generated, they were not really knowing what they were doing, and that some sort of evil end would come to the software developed by these “ignorant” coders using high level tools. Who could possibly create software when you were completely out of touch about what they were really doing at a binary level.

Well, I openly admit that using high level tools may produce code that is less efficient as hand coding every line, carefully scrutinizing every function and operation. But let’s step back and take a lesson from history of technology. First, things first… there was no “dooms day.” Programs written by “ignorant” programmers using high level programming languages, worked. What’s more, nobody codes in assembler any more, except in very niche applications. What is true is that high level programming languages empowered more people to produce more helpful software that has been successfully adopted by millions of users around the globe. How many programs do we use today were developed using assembler? “Very Few” is the answer.

History shows us that advancement in tools that help deliver the software that people want are not “evil.” Nor is it true that the people using these tools are “ignorant”. I would argue that the people using empowering tools may be “ignorant” about the technical details of what is happening under the covers, BUT they are actually “enlightened” individuals knowing more about the end product. Making technology more usable empowers people with knowledge about the final “solution” to become more involved in producing the solution. Moreover, people using these tools are able to focus more about the “what” the applications should do over the “how” to do it. The end result is better solutions, faster. There is no evil in this. And just because I don’t know how to repair my car, does not mean that I cannot use it to do some very productive things… like getting to work. Software tools are getting more advanced, and like our cars, we can use them to reach our “software destinations” without all being certified mechanics.

I personally grew up on code generators, in the 80’s “case tools” were all the rage. I leaned to design better systems, by worrying less about the “how to build” and more about the “what to build”. I learned that, as a project manager, I could get more productivity from my team, in less time and to higher quality standards by using automated coding tools. I learned that most of the programmers where happier to concentrate on the desired business goals of the project than on the correct syntax for a particular line of code. And to acknowledge the “dooms sayers” that, yes, you cannot escape the technology and that performance still needs to be considered. But that said, it less of an issue than they would like to make it to be. By producing the solution faster, and testing it earlier, you can identify the performance bottlenecks and call in the hard-core techies to “save us all” as needed. But what I found is that, in reality, the performance issues may only be relevant in 15% of an application. The other 85% can operate happily as is. Either there is no performance issue to begin with, or that this particular part of the system is used only by a few users, or that used so infrequently that it is not worth the investment to make it high performance.

Now I’ll share with you the answer I gave to the question “will it make me lazy”. My answer is “No, it will make you productive.” Why would we think it is “lazy” to not do things the hard way? To me, if you are achieving your goals, faster that’s hardly the definition of lazy. For a non-technical user to undertake the task of making a website is hardly lazy. For a professional web developer to not waste time hand coding pages that can be generated out-of-the-box is not lazy. To direct your energy in to value added features rather than debugging code is not lazy. Using the right tools for the job is “smart” not lazy.

If your objective is to learn to code, then a code generator is not going to prevent that from happening. Only you will prevent yourself from learning. Back to my car analogy, just because I can drive my car does not prevent me from learning to be a mechanic. In fact, true story, as a teen I learned all the basics of car mechanics from a small book and my old car. I spent a lot of time learning by doing, starting small, with fixing hoses to eventually rebuilding much of the engine and brake system. Having a car to tinker with did not impede my learning, it helped me learn. Likewise having a code generator to tinker with can actually be a learning aid. By enabling features, studying the code generated you can learn in an interactive, “by example” manner. In the same way that I worked my way “up” in my car mechanic skills; you can work your way up the technical learning curve as you have the need and inclination. But the great part is you can still have your working web site while you are learning.

With the introduction of dbQwikSite Developer Edition, I would say that using dbQwikSite code generator as a learning aid is even more practical than ever before. Developer Edition let’s you insert your own custom code into the generated code. So, you can “tinker” with your pages with ease. You can see how things are working in the code and add your own code to make your pages do more, adding features without having to be an expert. You can learn to code one-line-at-a-time while dbQwikSite fills in all the gaps. And, of course, if you are an expert in JavaScript or Server Side scripting you can make your generated pages do things only you can dream of.

To all the authors of all the blogs I read about “real programmers”, I offer the following counter points.
1) It is not every do-it-yourself web builder’s objective to become a coding guru
2) Understanding code is important but not more important than understanding the web site functionality that you are building.
3) If you bill or are paid by the hour, it would be professionally “negligent” to insist to hand code every single web page when there are tools available to enhance your productivity.
4) Coding is a means to an end, not an end into itself.
5) Don’t sweat it, “real programmers” are still needed, for all the “cool creative” stuff. Let the code generators do all the “boring repetitive” stuff.

Google Checkout++ new in dbQwikSite 5.2.3.0

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Today we released dbQwikSite 5.2.3.0. This release concentrates on enhancing payment gateway support. There are two major payment gateway enhancement offered in this release. The first is the addition of support for Google Checkout and the second is the ability to add your own payment gateways to dbQwikSite.

Those who know Google Checkout, likely know that there are two flavors of checkout; a single charge checkout and a multi-item checkout. The good news is that dbQwikSite support both flavors. If you just want to bill the bottom line, then the single item checkout is what you want. If you want to have an itemized billing then the multi-item checkout is just the ticket.

When it comes to native payment gateway support, the list now includes: PayPal, Google Checkout, Authorize.net, World Pay, SecPay, and VCS. However that is only the beginning, now you can add your own payment gateway support to dbQwikSite. Under the covers, we have added a payment gateway plug-in architecture, which means that not only TheDevShop, but also you, can add new payment gateways without the need for programming. So, virtually any payment gateway can be supported by dbQwikSite.

Adding a new payment gateway involves defining XML and XSL files. There are basically 2 steps, define the user input needed during design this is done using an XML document, and define an XSL that transforms saved dbQwikSite model into a web script. To create payment gateways you likely need some proficiently in XML Style Sheets. The great part is that these gateway plug-ins not project specific, that means that they can be shared amongst users. There is no “compiling” or “updating” involved, just drop the XML/XSL in the right folder and “presto” a new payment gateway. If you do happen to delve into creating a payment gateway plug-in and want to share it, just send the files to support and we will add them to the plug-in download page. Other users, I am sure, will be most appreciative. Documentation on how to create payment gateway plug-ins can be found on the dbQwikSite download page http://www.dbqwiksite.com/download.html in the “Other Downloads” section.

On other news, many people are asking about Developer Edition. It is definitely still on the product road map. The release has been delayed as we decided to do some serious R & D into two areas: “proper” .net support and Web 2.0 support. As that effort winds down we turn our attention back to developer edition. We have just set up our first beta tester and we are starting to move forward on the development of Developer Edition. An later this year, you should see some great stuff as a result of our R & D being incorporated into the product.

2008 New Year Message from TheDevShop

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2007 has come and gone, a good year all and all. We did a few interesting outsource projects and we managed to release major upgrades to all of the dbQwik Family products. dbQwikSite took second price in the national software industry awards. TheDevShop was named “Finalist” in Red Herring’s Asia’s Top 100 most promising privately help IT companies. We couldn’t have done it without our dedicated staff and our customers. As I bid farewell to 2007, I do so offering a “super-duper-mega-humongous” THANK YOU to employees of TheDevShop Ltd. and to our Customers who not only support us financially, but serve as a source of inspiration as well.

Now TheDevShop enters 2008, a bright new year with a bright new plans and dreams. What coming in 2008? Some may have noticed that TheDevShop planned releases of dbQwikSite for Q4 2007 did not materialize, and things got very quite in the marketing and communications. What happened is that we were given an opportunity to work on a large scale social networking, web 2.0, dot Net project. I saw a huge synergy in the project and the dbQwikSite product road map. So we put R&D on hold in exchange for some heavy duty hands on experience into the technologies that we want to incorporate into dbQwikSite and dbQwikEdit. While this resulted in the delay of dbQwikSite releases, it also means that we are well positioned now to incorporate all the knowledge gained in our latest project into the tool. The new result should be a new dbQwikSite in 2008 which will be a major leap forward into the world of web 2.0. dbQwikSite will be doing all the cool stuff in AJAX and .net producing Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) in the blink of an eye.

dbQwikEdit is also on the road map for some major changes in 2008, with stronger support for XML being our primary target. Look for a hybrid database / XML tool, marrying the two technologies. Expect to see XPath and XQuery support in 2008.

dbQwikReport is due for a reunion in 2008. dbQwikReport began as a spinoff of dbQwikSite to provide users with a simple way to create reports on web hosted databases using standard scripting technology. dbQwikReport has received a lot of interest from the community. There seems to be a real demand for a simple, light weight reporting solution for hosted databases. In 2008 we hope to migrate the reporting features of dbQwikReport back into the dbQwikSite framework. This should result in some major improvements in terms of user interface and flexibility.

2008 holds a lot of promise for our users, who will see the advent of the next generation of the dbQwik family of tools on your desktops. For us at TDS it is a very exciting and ambitious plan. We are committed to develop the best tools possible to support technology trends. And always in the spirit of “dbQwik” we will be packing high-tech knowhow into simple to use, affordable software.

Be sure to subscribe to this blog to be informed of the latest developments from TheDevShop.

dbQwikEdit SQL Tool Prices Slashed

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dbQwikEdit, TheDevShop's multi-database data manager has just gotten cheaper with Pro version selling for only $39.95 USD. That's an incredible price, the competition can't even come close, neither in price or functionality. I did a quick survey on the Internet, most competing products are priced between $69 to $250 USD. That makes dbQwikEdit the best value in town.

For those who are not familiar with dbQwikEdit, it is an SQL tool and visual query builder. It works with most databases so you don't need to buy and learn a different took for every database you use. Like all the dbQwik family of tools, dbQwikEdit does not require that you have advanced programming and technical knowledge to use the tool productively. But if you happen to be a database SQL guru, the tool has no problems supporting the demands of power users.

You can find more information and a free trial edition on the web http://www.dbqwikedit.com/

dbQwikEdit 3.4.0.0 Adds Office 2007

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Today we release dbQwikEdit 3.4.0.0. In this release, we add a few new features that some users have been looking for as well as the regular set of bug fixes to known issues.
The two highlights of this release is a reworked connection wizard and Office 2007 support.
Building ADO connection strings easier than ever using the new connection wizard. That said, sometimes easy just doesn’t go far enough. Our power users have been demanding more control over their connection strings. The new connection wizard opens the door to entering connection strings manually.

The other major update is the addition of Office 2007 support. What does “office 2007 support” mean? It means that dbQwikEdit can now work comfortably with MS Office new “x” file formats. When using MS Access you work with accdb office 2007 formats in addition to the classic mbd files. MS Excel xsl and xslx file types are both supported in this release of dbQwikEdit.

If you are not a MS Office user yet, there are still a slew of bug fixes that make upgrading worthwhile. We clean up some exceptions and fixed some irritating bugs. Some of these bugs include: inability to modify primary keys in some cases, adding fields sometimes missed the “not null” option, specifying lengths of MS Access text fields at times was missing and a few minor tweaks to the data grid.

Existing version 3 users can get the latest release by running live update from the help menu, new users or users of older version can get more information about available upgrades at www.dbQwikEdit.com