OpenEdge Advanced Business Language

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OpenEdge Advanced Business Language, or OpenEdge ABL for short, is a business application development language created and maintained by Progress Software Corporation (PSC). The language, typically classified as a fourth-generation programming language, uses an English like syntax to simplify software development.^[1] The name was changed in 2006 to OpenEdge Advanced Business Language (OpenEdge ABL), by PSC, from PROGRESS, a.k.a. Progress 4GL, in order to overcome a presumed industry perception that 4GL's were less capable than other languages.^[2] The language was called PROGRESS or Progress 4GL prior to the release of version 10.0. A subset of the language, called SpeedScript, is used in the development of web applications.^[3]

OpenEdge ABL helps developers to develop applications optionally using its own integrated relational database and programming tool. These applications are portable across computing systems and allow access to various popular data sources without having to learn the underlying data access methods. This means that the end-user of these products can be unaware of the underlying architecture.

By combining a fourth generation language and relational database, OpenEdge ABL allows the use of the Rapid Application Development (RAD) model for developing software. A programmer and even end users can do rapid prototyping using the integrated and GUI tools of the development environment.

[edit] History

Dec 10, 2002 Progress Dynamics 2.0 announced - the application environment for the OpenEdge business platform^[4]

Feb 17, 2004 OpenEdge 10 announced^[5]

2005 OpenEdge Studio packages^[6]

• Progress Version 9
• Progress WebClient
• Progress Dynamics Version 2.1

Feb 8, 2006 OpenEdge 10.1 announced - addition of object-oriented extensions to ABL, and new auditing service^[7]

Feb 13, 2007 OpenEdge 10.1b announced - adds support for 64-bit data formats^[8]

April 15, 2008 OpenEdge 10.1c announced - first business application development platform to support IPv6^[9]

[edit] Hello World example

Main article: Hello world program

The following ABL code creates a window with the text "Hello, World!" and a button labeled "OK".

DEFINE VARIABLE w AS HANDLE NO-UNDO.
 
CREATE WINDOW w ASSIGN 
    WIDTH = 50
    HEIGHT = 5
    MESSAGE-AREA = FALSE
    STATUS-AREA = FALSE.   
 
CURRENT-WINDOW = w.
 
DEFINE BUTTON btnOK LABEL "OK" SIZE 12 BY 1.2.
FORM 
    "Hello World!" VIEW-AS TEXT AT COL 20 ROW 2
    btnOK AT COL 20 ROW 4
    WITH FRAME f SIZE 50 BY 5 NO-BOX THREE-D.
 
VIEW FRAME f.
ENABLE btnOK WITH FRAME f.
WAIT-FOR "CHOOSE" OF btnOK.
DELETE OBJECT w.

OR let openEdge think for you and create a simple message box:

message "Hello World!"
    view-as alert-box INFO buttons ok.

also, you can use ERROR and WARNING instead of INFO to change the message icons

[edit] Notes

1. ^ Campbell, John, Programmer's Progress, a guide to the progress language. white star software, 1991
2. ^ Salvador Vinals, Introducing OpenEdge Advanced Business Language (ABL), PSC whitepaper, 2007
3. ^ Crawford, G. WebSpeed Complete, Innov8 Computer Solutions, ISBN 0-9718679-0-9
4. ^ Progress Dynamics 2.0 announced
5. ^ OpenEdge 10 announcement
6. ^ Progress OpenEdge Studio
7. ^ OpenEdge 10.1 announcement
8. ^ OpenEdge 10.1b announcement
9. ^ OpenEdge 10.1c announcement

[edit] References

• Sadd, J. OpenEdge Development: Progress 4GL Handbook, Progress Software Corporation, ISBN-10: 0923562044, ISBN-13: 978-0923562045
• Kassabgi, G. Special Edition : Using Progress, Que Publishing, ISBN 0-7897-0493-5

[edit] See also

• Progress Software
• Fourth-generation programming language