YES! YES! Version 1 would be a huge improvement for me, and I will explain why in a moment, however, the limitation of no combo boxes would be an issue. And I am not thinking about relationships, but many a form has a static list of choices (shipping methods, etc.) that would make this much more useful to me.
Now, here is where I see the big plus for my requirements. Aware is primarily a RAD tool. I can build systems with minimal coding, I don't have to worry about CRUD logic. Users interact with the data primarily via either queries or forms. The queries look "pretty much" like the competitors and while there are wanted enhancements (Jaymer wants to sort / filter on calculated fields, I want to control button placement, I wish I could place a button in ANY column or distribute buttons throughout the row...but I am getting off topic and yes, I know I can create a "custom" form but that limits some of the build in functionality of queries) the queries are fine for my needs.
Back to forms, there seem to be 2 types that I run into, One is the "setup" type of form. This is not where the user spends most of their time. This might be adding new users, maintaining a list of ship methods, etc. and they need to be functional not necessarily have all the bells and whistles that we need in the "main" forms. Aware does this in a RAD methodology now and nothing will change.
The main forms for an order entry system might be the customer maintenance form and the order entry form. There are many tools (like Pinegrow, coffee cup web form builder) that allow me to build a "pixel perfect" form and not just pixel perfect, but with the colors, fonts, spacing, etc. that other tools do with no problem. So I would find it a huge improvement if I could just use one of these tools to create my beautiful form and then just call it like any other form in Aware.
I understand why many folks would like an enhanced form editor integrated into aware's form designer (like Mark and others suggested), HOWEVER, let me tell you why I don't want that.
Just like Jasper reports, I use the jasper server and jasper studio because it gives me much more functionality than what I have using the built in Jasper report builder. Vlad's team is focused on building the best RAD tool, not the best report writer (and the Jasper comparison is not really valid since to use that you need to write SQL and install the server, etc. etc.
Reading how Vlad plans to implement this new form functionality only means we get to use our FAVORITE html editor instead of what Vlad writes in aware.) How much energy will be needed to make a form editor in aware have even 1/2 the functionality of a pinegrow? A LOT! So unless there is a way to license and integrate another world class form editor in Aware, I do NOT want Vlad to spend months building a "junior" PineGrow.
To say this another way, While it is compelling to say that our development stack ONLY requires Aware and a SQL backend, I do NOT mind using other tools when they are better for the task. I don't need aware to be a swiss army knife and do everything. Since this should be a much simpler task to import HTML / CSS and Javascript (question about this in a moment) than engineer a great html editor, this leaves Vlad's developers time to focus on enhancing aware's core functionality (speed, reliability, etc.)
So some questions vlad;
1). How will you handle any javascript hard coded into the form? Cause, one of the features I would use is cursor positing, and other things that would be easy to do using JS that is embedded in the form
2). What about CSS that is not local on the aware server? Will I be able to have my custom form point to external CSS libraries.
3). Would you be able to handle static combo boxes, radio buttons?
OK, this is getting WAY too long....
Thanks for listening
Bruce
