Database software is hardly exciting, but without this essential piece of software your business is not likely to maximise its full potential. Unfortunately, databases are either too complicated to use, like Microsoft's Access, or they're not powerful enough, as with FileMaker Pro. Alpha Five v6, on the other hand, fits the bill amicably by being both relatively easy to use and scaleable. It's great value too. In addition, an optional Web Application Server will put Web-based applications within the reach of thousands of designers (rather than the elite few) and will also open the market for non-developers to realise how much a database-enabled Web site can enhance their businesses. Alpha Five v6.0 is one of the best products in its field and should be considered by any new company - or one that wants to become more Web-centric.

Pros: Easy to use; menu-driven scripting; supports Web publishing
Cons: Requires activation; runs on Windows only


Alpha Five is a Windows-based relational database application that's an easy-to-use alternative to Microsoft's Access and FileMaker Pro. One of the reasons why it's so easy to use is that it requires no programming, thanks to a point-and-click Web Component Builder that enables you to build browser-based databases without touching a single piece of PHP, ASP, Perl or JavaScript code. This is advantageous to new users, but it also helps seasoned developers to develop powerful Web-based applications using MySQL in a small fraction of the time it would require to build the applications with programming tools.

Alpha Five also supports its own Web Application Server (£399 ex. VAT) and is designed to work with an Apache Web application server for load balancing in high transaction environments. Although the software can be used from scratch to create databases, larger companies will appreciate the way data from their existing ODBC-compliant databases such as MySQL, IBM DB2, Access, SQL Server, Oracle, and QuickBooks can be accessed. Version 6 also works with its own DBF engine.

A relational database organises data into related rows and columns as specified by a relational model. The data is stored in such as way that it can be added to, and used independently of, all other data stored in the database. If a user changes a field in one record, the database automatically changes the same record in all related views, allowing for easy global updating. A user can also query a relational database without knowing how the information has been organised and generate reports and comparisons by selecting files of interest and creating new tables.

It's worth noting that not all databases are relational and not all relational databases are built on the client/server paradigm. Having said that, most of the time you'll want a relational database server, so it's important to clarify the distinction. Access, for example, is a relational database, but it is not a database server. MySQL, SQL Anywhere, DB2, and Oracle are all relational databases and database servers.

A database server is a specialised process that manages the database itself. The applications are clients to the database server and they never manipulate the database directly - they only make requests for the server to perform these operations. This allows the server to add many sophisticated features, such as transaction processing, recovery, backup, access control and so on without increasing the complexity of every application. The server also reduces the risk of data file corruption, if only because only the server writes to the database (a crash on any client machine will not leave unflushed buffers).

For example, if you open a DBF or MDB file stored on a file server you need to retrieve every record just to filter out which ones you really need. But if you connect to a database server, such as Alpha Software's Web Application Server, it filters out the unneeded records and sends to the client only the data that really matters.

Alpha Five v6 is more than an obligatory upgrade. In fact, there are over 250 new features and enhancements, making it one of the most significant upgrades in Alpha Software's 22-year history. Perhaps the key enhancement is the Application Server that allows you to access your data over the Web. Alpha Five's Web Component Builder also lets you create sophisticated browse and form controls that work inside Web pages.

Version 6 also offer security features to keep your data safe by allowing you to create different security levels for departments or individuals using passwords. The software has better support for HTML, including a WYSIWYG HTML editor, new Xbasic functions for converting to and from HTML, and the ability to use HTML in your Xdialog boxes. While ActiveX is primarily for programmers, even if you don't know Xbasic (Visual Basic-like language used to develop Alpha Five), the power it can add to your forms and Xdialog boxes is great. As you may know, ActiveX components are program components that are installed into Windows. With ActiveX, you can add a Web browser window to your form, create visual graphs, and more.

With ADO and ODBC support you can now use Alpha Five to view, edit, and modify data in virtually any format. You can also connect to MySQL, Oracle or Access databases and tables, and even Excel spreadsheets can be used as a live data source. Enhanced Action Scripting and improvements to the Action Scripting Editor allow you to build full-featured applications relatively easily and quickly without programming.

There's also a raft of new functions, methods, properties and expressions, along with an improved Code Library, which make it possible to store, organise and insert an unlimited number of Xbasic and Xdialog code snippets. Finally, the Delete Duplicate Record Genie makes it much easier to review and delete duplicate records side by side, and there are new Genies that automatically build tables by inferring the structure from Sample Data.

The Genies, which are dialogs, are fairly simple to understand because they use 'plain English' rather to coding gobbledegook. Genies exist to support all aspects of the application development process, such as creating databases, laying out reports, querying data, manipulating data and building custom applications, and help to ensure accurate data entry.

Another really neat feature is that Alpha Five includes an e-mail application with support for both plain text and HTML formatting. The software also automates sending and receiving of e-mail, and you can write scripts that send messages merged with data from your database. You can also automatically respond to the contents of e-mail, filtering the contents of your inbox and responding with Action Scripts - just like with any decent e-mail client.

If your company has been using a database for years and it's working fine with little overheads in terms of time and cost, there's probably no need to swap. On the other hand, if you're a new company or one that wants to become more Web-centric, Alpha Five's menu-driven tools can now generate HTML and give a database a Web interface without you having to use any code - you specify your preferences and the software writes the code for you.

Active scripting menus, choosing such options as date format, colours, the type of field, and data update permissions, 60 built-in cascading style sheets, and the ability to open the code and revise it directly should further appeal to the experienced coder, making Alpha Five v6 one of the best products of its type.

BIOS, Jan 06, 05 | Print | Send | Comments (0) | Posted In Business