Make Mine MAPPER #36 -------------------- by Rob Haeuser OpenMAPPER: First Impressions ----------------------------------------------------------------- Wow! Can you believe it's 1994 already? I was barely used to writing 1993 on my checks. If you ask me, this 'time' thing needs some reconsideration. On the one hand, you never have enough of it, and on the other, it's what you have nothing but. Now, I ask you, does that make sense? So now that a bunch of it has expired, we can reflect back on it, and waste some more of it in the process. Truly an awesome concept. Overall, it was a good year for MAPPERland. MAPPER came of age, so to speak, by achieving a level of tenure shared by only a handful of programming languages. Not many have been around for 25 (oops! make that 26) years. Assembler, Cobol, Fortran, and umm, err, well, there must be a few more. Not that I dislike major releases, but not having to contend with one in 1993 somehow made the year seem a lot less frantic. Level 37 is looming on the horizon, but hopefully will be as easy as the transition from 35 to 36. Of course the highlight of the year for me was the fall Use Conference. There was so much MAPPER-speak I was getting dizzy. Or maybe it was from too much champagne. My three souvenir MAPPER 25th anniversary glasses were full at one or more points during the celebration. But, most importantly, I was honored to be given the opportunity to participate in some small way in the beta testing for the new MAPPER System for Windows, or OpenMAPPER (OM), as it is being called these days. They must be serious about the OpenMAPPER stuff though, because they've trademarked it. Historically, beta copies of software have been known to harbor ill code, so, in all fairness to Unisys, I am not going to fully review OpenMAPPER until it is officially released. However, since I need to write about something, I thought I'd give you some of my first impressions. It loads like any other Windows application. Insert floppy, click, insert floppy, click. After about six clicks, you're ready to bring it up. The remainder of the floppies are loaded from within OM (there were 13 in all). Unlike the earlier version of PC MAPPER, which created an initial database of nearly 32 Meg, OM installs in much less disk space (approximately 12 Meg), and will dynamically expand as your database grows. Nice touch. Bringing it up takes a few seconds, during which you get to briefly see a grid of blue 3-D boxes overlaid by a green map of the world with the words "The OpenMAPPER System" in large font. So dramatic! The initial window for the original PC MAPPER (PCM) was not sized correctly, so the first thing I would have to do is click it bigger. Just mildly irritating. This is corrected in OM, where the initial window is a nice 24-by-80 screen. Thank you. So now we're signed in. The function key bar has those 3-D grey buttons that actually move when you click them. PCM had the colored boxes, ala the new look, and is prettier to look at, but they didn't give you a tactile sense. You know, I've nearly decided that the brain actually likes the reinforcement of a moving button. Plus, the little hand giving the button the finger (even if it is the wrong finger) somehow appeals to my rebel side (take that, cursed button!). Ahh hahahahaha! One of the first things I do when signing in is to switch to 'classic' look. In PCM, this meant a dull white, barely readable logo. Thankfully, they changed to high-intensity in OM. Interestingly, the OM function key bar remains on display, even in classic look. To me, this is desirable, since it means that a user can still click on a function button, and the run sees it as though they had pressed the key. On the down side, there are no numbers on the function buttons, so, if you like to press keys, you have to count across. I guess the mouse is now functionally ingrained, eh? One of the nice touches in OM is the "graphical interface", which adds a Windows scroll bar to the function masks. A common complaint about MAPPER in general is the limited view that a function mask gives (usually up to 80 characters). This can really be a pain if your records exceed 80, which they usually do, and you have numerous fields to process that aren't contiguous. Holding and shifting prior to calling the mask is tedious, and won't always give you the view you need. In the past it meant that you would have to go to the store, buy some peanuts, feed them to a run-designer, and then whip a run out of them while they were still satiated. No more. With OM, you can enter some parameters, scroll the function bar sideways, and continue to enter to your heart's content. In essence you have up to a 256 character function mask! So throw out all those stale peanuts! One comment: it may take you a little while to get used to the new-new look of the scrolling function bar (is that like the dancing bear?). Speaking of which, if there was classic look, then the new look, what is this, the new-improved, whiter-than-white, colors-won't-fade look? Three cheers for OM, eh? Fortunately, it is quite easy to toggle between classic, new, and new-improved looks, although it seems as though a good bit of the new functionality for OM ('import', 'export', 'connect' under File; 'relational database interface', 'report writer', etc. under Tools, etc., etc.) are only available in the new-improved look. In fact, you get a completely different tool bar across the top when you go into new-improved look. Oh well. At least signing out is still pretty simple. Overall, OM looks good. I am reserving judgement on the help, though, as it is now almost completely in the Windows tradition of click-button graphical glop (sorry, did my prejudice just show?). Personally, I hate Windows help. ... Something tells me that Unisys might try to blur MASM MAPPER and MAPPER-C together again, this time by sticking the word 'open' in front, but I still hear two distinct level numbers being bantered about, so don't you 2200 guys start freaking out yet. If you hear Unisys announce a really good C compiler for the 2200, then start freaking out. Latest word: look for OM to be released sometime in the second quarter of 1994. I'm waiting with mouse-baited breath. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Rob Haeuser has 19 years of Data Processing experience. He was MAPPER Coordinator and Run Designer for the Texas Department of Human Services for ten years, and is now an independent contractor working in the Austin area. He also authored and is marketing a set of MAPPER run utilities called GURU. Covering MAPPER topics ranging from technical to tacky, his never-ending quest is for truth, justice, and the MAPPER way. Please direct all communications to: GURU Enterprises Attn Rob Haeuser 3212 Great Valley Drive Cedar Park, Tx. 78613 or call: 512-335-3862 (fax) / 512-331-0498 (voice)