Use PowerCOBOL Version 3.0 to:

• Create and manipulate application interfaces using graphical tools
• Include event-driven programming objects in applications
• Develop multi-platform client/server applications
• Use sound, pictures, and video in multimedia applications
• Use built-in development tools
• Create graphical applications

Create Application Interfaces
To create graphical user interfaces (GUIs) and client/server applications using existing COBOL expertise, PowerCOBOL offers the industry's most powerful and practical Windows-based tools. COBOL programmers will find all the capabilities needed to produce state-of-the-art, two- and three-tier, GUI-based client/server applications. The ability to handle visual processing tasks in COBOL reduces training, maintenance, and other costs. PowerCOBOL is thus ideal for adding GUI front-ends to existing COBOL applications or building entirely new applications for Windows platforms.

Quick Visual Programming
PowerCOBOL makes short work of GUI design by enabling you to create graphical interfaces visually. You assemble visual application windows by dragging and dropping graphical elements into the configuration you want. When you design the interface windows, choose among all the standard types of graphical elements, including scroll bars, push buttons, and images. You place these elements wherever you want and control details such as fonts and colors.

You can also take full advantage of multimedia data types such as audio and video that are available in the Windows environment. To create a new application or enhance an existing one, you begin by creating a window using PowerCOBOL's visual programming capabilities. Then you edit the event procedures associated with each of the window's graphical elements. Finally, you compile, link, debug, and execute the application as you would for any COBOL program. PowerCOBOL provides the facilities to perform all these steps and more on the Windows platform.

Event-driven COBOL
While traditional COBOL programs utilize a procedural approach, that approach limits the choices users can make in a graphical environment. Graphical interfaces must permit users to click on buttons or scroll bars or any other on-screen function at any time and get the proper response. Event-driven code makes this flexibility possible by eliminating the need for developers to foresee every possible action users might take. Behind every graphical element is a chunk of event-driven code.

Event-driven Programming
PowerCOBOL offers complete support for event-driven programming. A user's mouse-click or keyboard entry initiates a PowerCOBOL event procedure, which can include COBOL code written by developers. Because the event-response structure is built into PowerCOBOL, developers can focus on the COBOL code at the heart of the application. PowerCOBOL takes care of organizing the responses. PowerCOBOL includes a variety of COBOL event procedures that you can modify by editing the text strings provided. You can also add your own procedures based on the PowerCOBOL examples. Creating PowerCOBOL event procedures is straightforward for COBOL developers because you treat on-screen controls as variables and manipulate them using standard COBOL syntax.

Develop Multi-platform Client/Server Applications
With PowerCOBOL's graphical-front-end capabilities, you can rapidly develop the client portion of client/server applications. The front-end functions take advantage of the PC's low-cost processing power and interactivity, reducing the load on costly mainframes or UNIX servers. End users get the ease of use they demand, while you minimize development time and cost. A key to client/server applications is database support, and PowerCOBOL delivers the ability to interact with a wide variety of databases. Using embedded SQL COBOL statements, you can furnish access to ORACLE, INGRES, and Sybase databases on UNIX platforms. You can access virtually any database using PowerCOBOL's Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) interface coupled with embedded SQL COBOL statements. In the interface windows of your applications, you can provide charts and graphs of database contents as well as sorted tabular listings.

Use Multimedia
On the Windows platform itself, PowerCOBOL allows you to interact with other Windows programs using Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) and Object Linking and Embedding (OLE). With DDE your applications can automatically exchange data with other Windows applications, such as spreadsheets and multimedia programs. You can use OLE to link or embed another application or pieces of another application into your application.

Use Powerful Built-In Development Tools
In addition to the COBOL compiler, linker, and full-function debug tool provided in PowerCOBOL, you get an interpreter that allows you to interactively build and modify your application. This feature eliminates much of the tedium of traditional code development.

As with any PowerCOBOL application, you begin interpreter-based development by defining an interface window. Then you describe an event procedure for one of the window's functions and have the interpreter analyze the procedure. You can edit and debug the resulting code until it works as desired. The COBOL compiler is then used to generate the final executable file of the application. Using the PowerCOBOL interpreter, you develop applications faster and still get compiled-code performance.

To provide comprehensive and consistent development features, PowerCOBOL furnishes a graphical, project-based development environment. A project contains all of an application's resources, including windows, procedures, bit maps, a COBOL source file, and a COBOL library file.

Use PowerCOBOL to Create Graphical Applications
The PowerCOBOL environment gives you all the advantages of a Windows tool bar and pull-down menus for fast development. You construct graphical windows and compile, link, execute, and debug applications without leaving the development environment. PowerCOBOL includes everything you need for creating graphical applications for Windows PCs.

Visual Functions

Basic Window functions
Common Windows function characteristics (a partial list):

• Combo box
• Push button
• Radio button
• Character string display item
• Table (list)
• Group box
• Check box
• COBOL Item display -On screen display and input formats can be specified in the same manner as a COBOL PICTURE
• Picture edit item
• Mouseless operation - Use of tab or PF key for program operation.
• PF key item
• Set focus method

Multimedia
Use of multimedia, such as images (BMP or JPEG format), photo CD, metafiles, and sound:

• MCI Item
• Image display item
• Metafile item
• Animation item
• Sound item
• Graph - Bar and pie graphs are supported.
• On screen display and input formats can be specified in the same manner as a COBOL PICTURE
• Graph item

Linkage to other applications
OLE and DDE linkage can be used to link with other applications running within the Windows environment. Applications such as Lotus 1-2-3, Excel, etc. can be linked with PowerCOBOL.

• OLE item
• DDE item
• Excel item

Platforms Supported
Microsoft® Windows® 95
Microsoft® Windows® 98
Microsoft® Windows® NT (3.51 or greater)