Re: Is Pear RADy ?

Justin Patrin wrote:

What about using HTML_Menu to improve the tables menu you've set up ? Possibly with some nested levels (a tree like thingy).

Good idea, but how do you nest them? Tables can be linked any which way. I ended up just showing the link-to tables beneath every table.

I guess this feature would require one more .ini file.

In addition, the formbuilder lacks support for sql enumerations (ex : status ENUM ('customer', 'prospect')) ; it should generate a drop down list (<select>) in those cases.

Yes, this would be good, but I don't think that DB_DataObject even supports enumerations... You could create a table that the field links to and it can create a select element for you.

That's better this way, actually. A linked table is easier to maintain than an enumeration.

There also could be some interesting feature making use of foreign keys. It may be somewhat tricky, though. Say you want to create a new Bill object, the form could present you with the list of all Contacts, since the 'bill' table contains a field like : contact_no integer REFERENCES contact (contact_no).

Have you looked into the links.ini in the DB_DataObject? FormBuilder already supports select generation for foreign keys (links), you just have to set it up in DB_DataObject. In addition, you should set display fields for the tables (see selectDisplayFields in the docs). Check here for some docs work-in-progress: http://opensource.21st.de/tiki-index.php?page=DB_DataObject_FormBuilder

No I did not see links.ini. That seems efficient and simple ; I did not yet give it a try though. I've been browsing a bit about RAD tools : I couldn't get phplens (http://phplens.com/lens/) to work properly, despite its price this software seems buggy to me. I've seen some other thingy, but couldn't find anything better than phpCodeGenie (http://phpcodegenie.sourceforge.net). If you know of any such database-centric RAD tool around, please let me know. About phpCodeGenie : this is simple and straight-forward, it generates some code for the usual task of editing tables, which code actually is a base on which you can start building the real application. In my case - developping an ERP/CRM intra(extra)net/extranet - this is a good tool, because there are _many_ tables linked in _many_ various manner. Now, phpCodeGenie does not make use of PEAR, and second it's quite limited. The whole project seems to involve a relatively basic knowledge of php, but the idea is good, and it works(tm). So here comes my question : wouldn't the features FormBuilder/Frontend attempt to provide better fit in a such code-generation application ? More generally, what about a graphical/semi-graphical (web/gtk/etc...) RAD tool specifically designed for PEAR ? pearBuilder ? -- og