| How long will Oracle forms & Reports survive??? [message #451681] |
Fri, 16 April 2010 02:00  |
shaz
Messages: 182
Registered: June 2009
|
Senior Member |
|
|
Hello Gurus,
There is a serious concern in my mind that i want to ask to the senior members of this forum that what will be the future of the developers working in forms and reports?
As oracle Apps is implementing in my company by ORACLE, it is said that there is nothing we could do post implementation. Whats the future of forms and reports developers?
Do developers like me have to migrate to Java or .NET or other technology?
And also what are the options if oracle forms and reports have unhealthy future? What about going for Siebel or OBI tools.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Re: How long will Oracle forms & Reports survive??? [message #454936 is a reply to message #451681] |
Sat, 08 May 2010 10:36  |
 |
Kevin Meade
Messages: 2103
Registered: December 1999
Location: Connecticut USA
|
Senior Member |
|
|
This is must one man's opinion.
Oracle's statement of direction says they will continue to support forms/reports indefinitely. It also says if you read between the lines, that new development should be done using java tools (eg. their Jdeveloper or something else).
Additionally, Oracle forms/reports has lost some functionality as a complete toolset. Most notably, there is no Oracle Graphics anymore. It is neigh on imposible these days to do graphing in Forms and I have no clue what people who had a huge investment in Oracle Graphics, did with all those graphs they had. None of the Oracle offered migration plans for graphics was in my opinion very effective.
I am a huge Oracle Forms fan. In my 30 years experience in IT, Oracle Forms stands out as the greatest developer platform I have used. Though it had its limitations, its productivity curve has yet to be matched by any other tool that has passed before my mind and fingers. I and many of my developer friends have searched high an low for a decade to find a suitable replacement for Oracle Forms. Something that is as easy to learn, and easy to build with. We have tried many things and have been dissappointed with all of them.
That said, I look around me and see lots of applications built in Oracle Forms/Reports at my company still in use, but no new development at my company being done in Oracle Forms/Reports. It has all gone the way of Java. I think java is expensive, slow, and error prone to work with, and I feel it is yet one more proof that the rest of the world can be wrong. Developer tools come and go. Java will eventually be dropped when the next "big idea" comes around. Till then, if you want to survive as a developer, you need to do java.
Maybe that is why I see more promise in working on the data side these days. I take the approach that if I can teach my database new tricks then I don't have to get the hundreds of programmers who write apps against my databases to roll over. The more the development world goes the way it is, the more I see the value of the database. If we have to use such crappy tools as Java, then getting the database to do more means needing less from the development side. Thus the right presentation of data and APIs from the database can take weeks, even months off the development effort. Of course it works even easier in reverse. The less you pay attention to the database presentation of data and database APIs, the more expensive it will be for you to write that Java app.
Indeed I have decided that if the database does a good job of presenting data perspectives for an application, then it is immaterial what tool you use to develope the application. In the end this is a good thing because by choosing the Oracle Database and making it do its job, I have reduced my project team's development burden, and given freedom to my project team to do tool selection by whatever criteria they deem appropriate. This goes a long way toward the success of any project.
Good luck, Kevin
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Re: How long will Oracle forms & Reports survive??? [message #467897 is a reply to message #455046] |
Wed, 28 July 2010 03:36 |
FredC2
Messages: 2
Registered: July 2010
Location: germany / Munich
|
Junior Member |
|
|
Hello Kevin, Hallo Kevin,
I have tried several times to install Forms 11g on my computer - without any success. For my last try I had to download several (zipped!) GB of software (Weblogic Server, Forms and Formspatch).
What about the lucky (and productive!) days where everything for the Forms Builder was just on one (1) CD.
In fact, I have still running some client/server 6.0 forms applications which do not need any Internet stuff, and if we would need this feature, we would just use remote deskops. Furthermore we will be that brave that we keep these applications running for a long, long time, perhaps somedays in a VM XP-Box...
In regards of user friendliness of the GUI on one side and development and maintance costs on the other side Forms applications are absolutly unbeatable. I guess if we have to develop these applications today with Java/Eclipse, Swing or whatever, the costs would be several(!) 10 times higher and the GUI would not be mutch "better" (spoken in a positive way). But now I'am giving up and my times as a long, long lastings Forms fan will end ( )
Unfortunately Oracle has blownup Forms incredible from version to version - now it's going to burst, I think.
I'am really sorry for ORACLE that they are going to kill one of it's roots.
Perhaps it's like the "Video killed the radio star" story (but video at least was an improvment).
@David
APEX is for me just some kind of (very) weak Forms surrogate. I will wait some years to see how this tool will be maintained and perhaps several times renamed and restructed(;>)
Best Regards, Heiko
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
] 
Blog
Search
Help
Members
Register
Login
Home
Perhaps they can call it "Forms & Reports Retro Edition V12".
