Posts by DecSoft

Hello Donald,

Is there a way to just download updated sample files without installing the AppBuilder?

I know sometimes there are new controls etc that need to be updated but if we are using already installed ones, and you make some changes is there a way to do it?

I think it would be useful as time changes things and samples get modified.......as you know.

No. At this time we can only update the whole installation, which include the apps samples. My recommendation to you is to maintain a copy of the applications by yourself. That is, supose you want to work in certain app sample. Ok. Copy that sample directory to another and work over that files instead the original ones. So that files never be touched by App Builder installations.

And one more thing while I am thinking about it. The .ab file is a text file and I was wondering if there is someway to view it as text and search it. I know I can do it as an extrernal editor but might be a nice feature for the app.

My thinking on this is that sometimes I need to find where something is like objects or variables and this helps me to locate them,

Any other ideas or ways to do this?

Thanks

Yes; certainly the ".ab" files (App Builder's project or app files) is an XML file, so we can open it with our desired editor and may search and replace something, for example. However, a search engine (including the replace or refactoring feature) must be included in the future to App Builder, just like other things I need to study it and then try to implementing.

My pleasure sir. :)

Hello,

Update your App Builder copy Donald: I add a new "unit" option into the Weather app sample.

Hello,

I forget to mention the Weather sample is a little special, in the sense that the first app's view (the home or main view) does not contain any button nor other control. In fact we use the view Show event with this code:

And there is the "GetWeatherData" app's function, which is responsible to retrieve the information from the app's server, that is, from the Open Weather Map API. Below is the "GetWeatherData" app's function:

Above we can see how we conform the appropiate URL, including the city we want to retrieve their weather. At this point we must modify that code in order to add another argument (the "units") into the URL. Then our PHP script receive such arguments and perform the appropiate Open Weather Map API call.

Hello Donald,

We can't use the Open Weather Map API directly from the application due to CORS limitations. So, how the application get the data from the API? The application uses a PHP script, who communicate with the Open Wheather API without CORS issues.

You can view such PHP script into the application folder and is in that PHP script in which we can view the Open Weather Map URL and then can add the appropiate argument (units) to it. If we plain to allow the application's user to change between units, then we must include in the application's HTTP call (used to retrieve the data) a new argument.

So the application inform to the PHP script to use the metric or the imperial unit. Probably I have sometime tomorrow in order to modify the Weather application sample in order to include the "units" option, then you can view how I implement it. Of course I take note about your suggestion. Of course a "global search engine" can be good, as well other things like a "code map". Good ideas.

Hello Donald,

The Weather app sample use the Current Open Weather Map API, and, yes, that API provide us with certain Units options. For example, the below URL:

Retrieve information using the Standard metrics unit.

But this other URL:

Retrieve the information using the Imperial units. So what we can do is to take in count the "units" argument in the URL, which can be "imperial" or "metric". If we simply omit this argument in the URL then the default units are "metric".

Thanks very much Donald!

Hello Donald,

HTML is an standard, however, the pieces we can add into HTML like controls, Javascript, style, etc., can be absolutely different from one application to another. Yes; maybe we can try something like that, since we can figure the output of an App Builder's similar product, but for sure the results not merelly the ammount of work in order to try something like that.

But this is not something related with HTML nor app's builders. If we thinking in Delphi, for example, we can't get a Delphi project from an executable file. Any decompiler can do something like that. We can get something like resources (Bitmaps, etc.) in the same way we can get it decompiling an HTML/APK file, but we never get the Delphi project again.

Anyway may you have some idea to do something and I can help you in that task... just post here whatever you wanted sir. :)

Hello Donald,

If someone uses Cordova to build an HTML application then we can get such HTML from their APK file, at least if they are not encrypted (I am not sure if this can be does or not at this time). However, converting an HTML application (and their Javascript, CSS and other possible stuff) into an App Builder's project... I think can be very, very difficult. Probably imposible if we expect a "complete" result.

Yes; we can start thinking in an HTML parser who try to understand what kind of controls are used and then try to reproduce in some way such controls, but, this, that can be an incredible work, may can works with an HTML application produced by App Builder, in other words, how we can imagine what kind of HTML and controls other applications can uses? Because there is not an standard or something like that.

Maybe I don't understand very well your question Donald, but, if I am not wrong, probably it's not possible to acchieve something like that Donald. Again, maybe I don't understand very well your question and can't imagine what exactly you need.

Hello Donald,

David or anyone,

If i wanted to create an estimating app, not a real complicaated one so that I need to tap into some server database somewhere, but rather a fairly small system with data that would be stored from a csv file or ??

I am not completely sure if understand your question (no doubt my poor english strikes again) but if you wanted to have some data source files for your application, in order to load such data and do something with that, probably the best suitable format for the source files can be JSON. We can take a look at the various JSON* samples included in App Builder.

In fact, we we load a JSON file, their objects are available "as is" in App Buidler. For example, note this JSON file used in the JSON app sample:

Once we get that file using an HTTP Client control, for example, we can access to their data very quickly:

The ID, Name and LastName are now into the appropiate variables, directly from the JSON response. Said that, probably a way to convert CSV to JSON using Javascript exists out there. I will take a look and try to provide such ability.

The app would then use dropdown selectors to choose various data values from the list. Each selection then selecting other button info that is filtered by the last selection, Usually there would be from 3 to 5 selections to make to get to the right item you wanted. Once you go there it would then return to you the price and a few other pieces of data.

This is perfectly possible Donald and in fact it's a common practice, so, what we need is to prepare the required Select controls, feed them with the appropiate data, and uses the Select control's events to be ready when the user choose certain option. Maybe a sample of this can be found in the Datatime application included by App Builder. When we select a year from the Years Select, we uses their Change event to update the contents of a Month Select control, and, in the same way, we use this last control Change event in order to update another Day Select.

Now you would take those selected items and data and put them into a list of information that could be added up and other factors used to modifiy the numbers. All math functions.

You know App Builder have dozens of Maths' related actions and even a Math action which can be used to evaluate math expressions. So it's a question of dealing with the various Select variables and these actions.

Finally all this would be produced as a report that could me email or text to someone using the phone share features.

Probably the best option is to send the mail by yourself using certain server script. Made an HTTP call from App Builder it's quite easy and we can provide such call with the appropiate data, as you can see in the application samples who uses the HttpClient control. The server script receive the required data (email address, user name, etc.) and can compose the email or receive it composed by our application.

I know out there are some APIs to send emails directoy from Javascript, but this APIs have a price (logical on the other hand) and probably we can avoid their use at least in our case by use a more or less simple server script.

What would be the best tools to use to create such a thing here?

What would be the best sample to start with?

I think you can familiarize with the App Builder's samples before start. I mentioned some of them above and probably they are sufficient to be ready to create your own application. Maybe the most complicated part is the files we talking above. I don't know if that files already exists, if you can create it using JSON (to be more easy to process), etc. But I am here if you need some help Donald.

I feel that connecting to a mysql server would be my first choice but not sure nor do I have the knowledge set to do that.

Remember the included Database sample. They are not too complicated, but shown us how to retrive information from a MySQL database, how to shown that information to the user, and how to insert, update and delete existing information. Again, if you have ANY question, do not hesitate to post here and I will try to help you. :)

Hello Walter,

You know I am busy with App Builder, between other things, but, as always, count with me if you need some particular help.

Hello,

Hi David,

I did not do anything and it started working.
Thanks.

Ok. If you found the problem again follow the above instructions.

Hello edunt,

Such error message is produced by another server running in your machine. You have two options: shutdown the server to allow the App Builder's server to work, or change the App Builder's server port number from "9999" to "9998", for example.

Hello,

Thanks for the links edunt!

Hello Nelson,

We can shown various alerts at the same time, but, these cannot be "stacked". May you want to try with the npTray plugin, which allow us to shown "balloons" or notifications into the application's icon tray. These "balloons" or notifications are integrated by default in the new Windows 8 (and greater) notifications system. The notifications cannot be staked, but appear in both: the application's tray icon and also inside the Windows notifications system.