SIRxs in Review

akaThe Joys of XS

Presented at SIR-UK Conference Dublin, Ireland, June 2008 ©Tom Shriver, DataVisor 2008

SIRxs in Review

Presented at SIR-UK Conference Dublin, Ireland, June 2008

©Tom Shriver, DataVisor 2008

Photo Rights Alex Comfort, M.D.

SIRxs in Review

The Joy of XS

Presented at SIR-UK Conference Dublin, Ireland, June 2008

©Tom Shriver, DataVisor 2008

4

Progress of this Presentation

First, a Show of Hands: Who’s converted to SIRxs?

Lots of new features I/we haven’t tried Please join in with your experience

For the Un-Converted: What are you afraid of?

Thursday should be a good time to explore details of conversion and potentials of SIRxs

5

Personal Experience Using for special work since 2005

Import & CSV Save File for long header names Converted First Production database 2007 At DCC / Columbia U.

New Databases being developed in SIRxs Slow (methodical) conversions of existing databases

o 13 Total SIRxs databaseso 7 Newo 6 Convertedo 35 To Go

DataVisor Conversion of Generic Products: Occassional Surprises

6

Long & Special SIR Names At Columbia still Standardizing on 8 char names

Controlled Testing on New databasesConversions from other db formats (eg Access, SAS)

DataVisor Long names for Output; Short for Database operations DV Products: DVPainter & DVSchema help enforce

standardization on 8 char names General Experience

Good but not extensive Amazing number of dependencies (eg PQL)

in local “utility” programs

7

String Length

New “Default” STRING LENGTH is 32 Sometimes affects existing application definitions Similarly:

Treatment of String System GlobalsSIR2002 global DBNAME padded to 8 charactersSIRxs global DBNAME trimmed

8

Master

During our Transition Period Found several “bugs”

Mostly regarding new Journaling CapabilitiesReceived several Master Updates December-May

Still Awaiting “File Based” Concurrency Manager

9

Journaling in SIRxs

The Change I was most anticipating Later Presentation & Discussion

10

SIRxs User Environment Settings

SIR.INI Now (Windows) stored in \Documents & Settings\...

Great improvement for end users viz a viz permissions Additional Settings

Sizes of things (eg dialog lists)

11

Schema in XS Common Var Definitions

RECORD SCHEMA 0 CIR Automatic I/O Column Assignments WRITE SCHEMA by Variable BDI “BLANK as UNDEFINED”

Saves a User Defined Missing Value New Date Formatting: “E” for “Exact” on input

DATE MYDATE (‘EMMiDDiYYYY’) Standard Vars Encryption

12

PQL Enhancements (1) As always, many enhancements

PQL Output Procedureso Standardization of optionso Long Names & “AS” for output nameso XML

PROCESS CASE with expressions (e.g. COUNT, SAMPLE) Functions

o Mostly to support new Featureso SYSTEM(81) hot off the press “Corruption Flag On?”o CLIPSET(string_to_copy_to_clipboard)

Interactive Debugger PQL Forms

o Some added functionality

13

PQL Enhancements (2) PQL Dialogs & Controls

Many new Object Types SLIDER, TREE, SPIN, ComboBox, PROGRESS

Font & GUI object color control(EDIT, LABEL, LIST, etc)

BUTTON with IMAGE rather than text prompt IMAGE: FILL & CENTER

Demonstration: Color Coded Fields on Data Screens Multi-Line Prompts in Screen Tabbed Page Navigation

14

PQL Enhancements (3)

WINDOW (MainMenu) New Look/Feel to some SIR MainMenu Options

TIMER Control (hot off the press)o ENABLE TIMER no DISABLE TIMERo Timer Message ID is -999o No MESSAGE TIMER block (as in PQL dialog)

PQL SERVER