GDC 2.30 new features

Discover the new features and changes in functionality introduced with Genero Desktop Client (GDC) 2.30.

Table 1. General features
Overview Reference

Drag & Drop support introduced in BDL 2.30.

See the Drag & drop topic in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.

WebComponent support in BDL 2.30 allows you to add any html-based component to your BDL application.

Support for WebComponent introduced with Genero BDL 2.30. GDC can embed a Component based on HTML / JavaScript™ / Flash and, via a small interface API, create a bridge between the component and 4GL. This allows you to add any html-based component to your 4GL application, such as a simple Image map which triggers a 4GL action when clicking on an area.

The GDC internal browser uses WebKit technology. If you want to use a plug-in for your WebComponent, you need to make sure that the corresponding plug-in is installed on the workstation where GDC runs.
Note:
  • The plug-in must be compatible with WebKit ; usually Netscape plug-ins (the technology used by Mozilla Firefox) are supported by WebKit.
  • If you want to use Flash inside GDC, you need to install either the Stand-Alone Flash player or the FireFox Plug-in. Having only an Internet Explorer (IE) plug-in is not sufficient, as IE plug-ins are based on a different underlying technology.
  • Plug-ins are similar to external libraries that are loaded at runtime. This implies that the plug-in must be binary compatible with GDC: if you run a 64-bit GDC, you need a 64-bit plug-in. This may be an issue if you run a Flash-based plug-in on Windows® , as today Adobe™ only provides a preview version of their Flash player on 64-bit Windows (code name "Square").

See the WEBCOMPONENT topics in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.
Table 2. Widgets
Overview Reference

Users of Genero Desktop Client 2.30 can now freeze table columns to ensure they remain visible when scrolling.

See the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.

Genero Desktop Client 2.30 supports "left", "right", "center", and "auto" alignment for column headers in a table.

See the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.

The INCLUDE attribute can now be used with the DateEdit calendar to prevent selection of invalid dates.

See the DATEEDIT item type topics in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.

End users can now add their own words to the Textedit / Spell Checker dictionary.

See the TextEdit style attributes topics in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.

Window size will be adjusted to fit an opened form with the "resetFormSize" Form style.

GDC tries to maintain the current window size. The window grows only if new content can't fit in the current size, and the GDC never shrinks a window. This is generally the best behavior, as you don't expect window size to jitter each time you change the content. Nevertheless, in the 4GL context of OPEN FORM ... DISPLAY FORM, it may make sense to shrink the window to the size demanded by the newly opened form, particularly if the new form is really small and you don't want to have a large window with lots of empty space. You can use the new "resetFormSize" form style attribute to indicate that the window must adapt its size to the newly opened form.
<Style name="Form.f1">
  <StyleAttribute name="resetFormSize" value="1" />
</Style>
 No additional reference.

Support for message styling has been added in 2.30. When using the MESSAGE or ERROR statement, you can customize how the information is displayed.

See the Message style attributes topic in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.

GDC 2.30 introduces the new style attribute for Window ignoreMinimizeSetting. The ignoreMinimizeSetting style attribute can be used to prevent a minimized window from being reopened in a minimized state.

See the Window style attributes topic in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.

The FORMAT attribute can now be used with SpinEdit widgets to support leading 0 format.

 See the SPINEDIT item type topics in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.

The Delete and Backspace keys now select NULL in a ComboBox.

 No additional reference.
Table 3. Monitor
Overview Reference

fgltty now uses qPutty for easier deployment and better support of macOS™ and Linux™.

 See the qPutty documentation.

fgltty now supports automatic port forwarding for SSH connections. Fgltty is now able to detect a free port which can be used by the Port Forwarding mechanism.

 See Port forwarding.

The GDC About box now has a Copy To Clipboard button, which will fill the clipboard with information that is useful when you contact your support center:

The Clipboard will contain:
  • GDC version information.
  • Command line used to start GDC.
  • Operating system information.
  • Copies of config.xml and hosts.xml.

When contacting your support center, you can copy/paste this information in your email; this should ease and speed support.

 See GDC information for better support.
Table 4. Miscellaneous
Overview Reference
Settings for REPORT TO PRINTER (in case of DBPRINT=FGLSERVER)

Printer and font settings can be overridden with two new 'standard' frontcalls.

When using DBPRINT=FGLSERVER and REPORT TO PRINTER, text reports are printed via GDC. Printer and fonts can be configured using the Option panel.

 See REPORT TO PRINTER settings (DBPRINT=FGLSERVER).
Animated GIFs support

Animated GIFs are supported for the IMAGE widget.

If you load an image which is an animated gif, it will be displayed as animated.

Animated GIFs are only available for the IMAGE form item. They are not supported where the image appears due to the IMAGE attribute (in buttons, toolbars, topmenus and so on). For performance reasons, animated GIFs are not supported in TABLE containers

 See Animated GIFs support.
WinMAIL: Specific Port for smtp

The server port can now be configured with a frontcall method when using WinMain and smtp.

When using WinMail and smtp, you can now specify the smtp server port in the SetSmtp function. To define the port, use the host:port notation.
CALL ui.interface.frontCall("WinMail","SetSmtp", [id,
 "smtp.mycompany.com:1234"],[result])

The default port remains 25.

 See WinMAIL: Specific Port for smtp.

For more information, see the Windows Mail extension documentation in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.
WinDDE: handling of ASCII/Wide char data

WinDDE can dialog with applications that require data in ASCII and applications that require wide char data such as UTF-16.

WinDDE can now dialog both with applications that require data in ASCII and with applications that require wide char data such as UTF-16. Since GDC 2.22.x, only wide char data were supported. Prior to 2.22.x, WinDDE was only able to handle ASCII. By default, WinDDE will automatically guess what is the best encoding when connecting to the DDE server. However, in some instances the returned information can be misleading. In these cases, you will have to set an optional 'encoding' parameter manually in the following DDE functions: DDEConnect, DDEExecute, DDEPeek and DDEPoke. Possible values are: "UNICODE" and "ASCII". For instance:
CALL ui.Interface.frontCall("WINDDE","DDEPoke", 
 [prog,"Sheet1","R1C1","value","UNICODE"], [res] );
 See WinDDE: handling of ASCII/Wide char data.

For more detail, see the WinDDE documentation in the Genero Business Development Language User Guide.