Oh goodness knows I certainly don't convert the DOS forms and then leave them like that! UGLY! For sure there's a bit of cleanup involved after converting, but lasso-ing everything and changing attributes is so easy to do. And I do convert all external eeps into internal code, and as I do so I check the code to see what can be changed, and what must be changed.
Sometimes I look at a multi-table DOS form and say "that needs to be a tabbed form". In that case I will usually create a new form with my tabs on it, convert the DOS form to another new form and copy and paste the fields onto the tabs. Most of the time the eep code will work fine. You watch out for keymaps, you watch out for form lookups within the code or form expressions. But if you were creating a form from scratch you would have to look at the DOS code for this info anyway, so no time savings starting from scratch. But the main reason I do this is to make sure I don't "lose" anything. So just want to reiterate for anyone starting a form from scratch, that you must first carefully look at every single field on that DOS form to see what eeps are run on entry and exit, and whether there are popup menus on the field. Also look at the table properties to find what eeps are run on entry, exit, save, leave section... If you convert those capabilities are brought over. Yes you may need to change them, but you won't miss bringing it over. They are easy to miss if you start from scratch. Karen > I guess we agree to disagree. > > In my experience, converting old DOS forms is just delaying the eventual > re-coding of the form to use the new tools. > > For example, the way lookups were handled on DOS forms and the way they > are > handles in the 7.X and newer versions is markedly different. > The entire approach to the operation of the form has changed radically > since > the DOS days, EEPS are now stored within the form rather than externally, > the new commands such as SELECT instead of COMPUTE give you SQL > compatibility. The advent of the PROPERTY construct alone with the > countless > (and I truly mean countless) options, that give you incredible > flexibility, > would make a re-write (rather than conversion) worth it. > I now also make extensive use of temporary tables and views created on the > fly, something that I just did not do in the DOS days...I don't believe > you > could. > In the DOS days I built applications using the Application Builder; now, > all > my application run from custom forms. > Last but not least, when converting forms, you bring the dated look and > feel > of the DOS forms. Even the look and feel of 6.5 windows was a dated hybrid > look; the look of the newer versions is truly compatible with the more > up-to-date Windows look. I can honestly say that I have spent more time > changing the look of converted forms than it would have taken to re-code > the > form in the first place. With availability of the form wizard, the simple > forms can be re-coded in a matter of minutes, and the more complicated > forms > definitely benefit from the new tools available. >
