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I had usually endorsed VistaDB since it seemed to me a great little database for small apps. I mentioned in this[^] post some of the features I liked the most. I also sometimes even defended it in Lounge discussions.
But two days ago I was using it for a project I had to deliver three days earlier and I spent all the morning finding ways around bugs or limitations in the SQL engine. I posted three different messages in the online forum that no one from the support group (or anybody for that matter) has answered as of today, even tough they already answered newer posts.
I submitted two issues for them, and I got only one reply saying that it was planned to be supported in version 3.0 due next year.
So, what were the issues?
- Trying to
JOIN a table to itself. Will be supported next year. Come on, is it really that different to JOINing one table to another? It works in Access.
- I was trying to perform a
INSERT INTO Table (....) (SELECT 'literal string', Field FROM Table WHERE ...) and it couldn't do it. Specifically it was blowing on the SELECT 'literal string' part, since the INSERT INTO Table (...) (SELECT ...) worked and a SELECT 0 returned a recordset with a 0 as expected. No reply on the forums, and definitely a bug for which I posted the issue and have gotten no reply. - And finally I had a query with a
LEFT JOIN, that if the records were found, it returned correct results, but if no matching records were found, it returned the values from matching records for antoher condition (year) instead of NULL. I also tried this on Access with the same data and I got the expected results.
I'm using the latest version (2.0.16 released about 15 days ago.)
The first time I tried it I really liked it (see the aforementioned post) but this time I put it into use for a bigger more demanding project, it fell way short. The concept is very nice (a small self contained database) but for real uses its implementations leaves much to be desired. Also, I previously had a good experience with support, but this time that I was really desperate they just never answered. 
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
The amount of sleep the average person needs is five more minutes. -- Vikram A Punathambekar, Aug. 11, 2005
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I found one more issue the other day and I'll take the time to document it here, in case I could help someone.
I had two tables, the first with foreign keys that identify records on the second table. Basically I wanted to update all records in the first table that had a related record in the second table with one field set to one value. Sounds easy.
First I tried my newly-learnt trick (a few weeks ago in the SQL forum here in CP  ):
UPDATE Table1 SET Field=False
FROM Table1
INNER JOIN Table2 ON Table1.ForeignKey = Table2.PrimaryKey
WHERE Table2.Field = 510It didn't work, complaining about the FROM being an unexpected token.
Ok, another try:
UPDATE Table1 SET Field=False
WHERE Table1.ForeignKey IN (SELECT PrimaryKey FROM Table2 WHERE Field = 510)So, did it work? Of course not!
Again, I posted my inquire in the support forum and the only response I got, about a week later was from another reader that said that he had had the same problem, and that VistaDB didn't seem to like compound statements. Still no word from support
Really, I still think it's a great product. But limitations like these are making it unusable for real life projects.
If anyone has other experiences, feel free to post them here.
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
The amount of sleep the average person needs is five more minutes. -- Vikram A Punathambekar, Aug. 11, 2005
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I hadn't checked in a while, but I'm getting there... soon, I'll have my first thousand posts!! Anyone wants a ![Beer | [beer]](https://www.codeproject.com/script/Forums/Images/beer.gif) ? 
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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Cool, almost almost there!! 
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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I didn't tell you, but I got that contract I was talking about here![^] (you don't need the link, just check below where it says "Uff... long proposal").
I started yesterday and, if my estimates are correct, I should finish by April 23rd. This week in two days I am almost finish with this week's work, so I expect by Thursday to have at least half of next week's.
It's been easy, since it's only creating the windows, toolbars, security system (user login and so on)... and I had already developed something similar earlier, so it was mainly copy/paste, tweak here, tweak there, more copy/paste, drag a control in the designer... we'll see how the following weeks turn up.
BTW, I improved my reusable multithreaded splash screen with status message, and I believe it would be a good CP article, expect it in the next few weeks.
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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Hello everybody (my lone reader)!
I hope you had a great Chrsitmas and a very happy New Year, and that your resolutions become true in 2005!
Last week I came back from my 25-day vacation to Australia and New Zealand. I'll provide a quick summary.
I arrived on the 12th to Sydney where my brother picked me up. We were there for two days and then started a road trip on a rented car (which I drove, on the wrong side of the road  ) and visited Bryon Bay, Nimbin, Surfer's Paradise (the Gold Coast), Hervey Bay, and Brisbane. When we were in Hervey Bay, we went to camp to Frasers Island, the largest sandy island in the world. We camped there for 2 nights, and drank about 300 ![Beer | [beer]](https://codeproject.freetls.fastly.net/script/Forums/Images/beer.gif) between 9 people  . We flew back to Sydney from Brisbane on the 22nd and met my parents there.
We spent Christmas Eve dining in my parent's hotel, with my brothers friends, and on the 26th we flew to Cairns where we went diving two days and the other to Kuranda to see some aborigenes and a tropical rain forest. On the 30th we flew to Auckland (New Zealand), we spent New Year's Eve dining in a nice restaurant and then standing on the base of the Sky City tower, where we saw the fireworks. One day we went to the Waitomo caves and somewhere close to Wellington to see a Maori museum. On Monday the 3rd, we took the plane back (a 12 hr flight followed by another 2 hr flight) and last Tuesday I arrived safely home.
Well, that's about it, in two quick paragraphs, a summary of my 25 days.
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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Here I am, at Los Angeles airport, waiting for my plane to Auckland. I've been waiting for about 4 hours and still have 2 more to kill.
I've been killing time mainly with MSN Messenger in my Pocket PC, but even that bored me already... and let's not talk about the difficulty of writing long messages in a handheld...
My flight to Aucklad will be around 13 hours long, and then, after a 4-hour wait, my flight to Sydney will take about 2 or 3 hours.
Oh well, let's continue waiting...
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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So, tomorrow I'm finally going on a long and required vacation! My brother is currently an exchange student in Sydney, and my parents and I are going to visit him.
I was going to go with my parents first to Tahiti and then to Syndey to meet my brother, but for some unknown reason (ok, they want a second honeymoon), my parents decided that I would fly directly to Sydeny while they would make a stop in Tahiti. So I asked to go a few days earlier.
The point is, I arrive on Sydeny on the 12th, and meet my parents there on the 22nd. My brother asked me to take my driving license because he and his friends have prepared a big roadtrip, and only I'm old enough to rent a car... they want to drive about 3500 kms (that's the number he told me) from Cairns to Sydney.
When we meet our parents, we'll spend about four days on each of the following cities: Sydney, Cairns and then Auckland in New Zeland. And I'm coming back to Mexico on the 3rd or January.
I'm very excited about going to the other side of the world, let's see how it turns up!
If I have time, I'll keep my single occassional reader informed with some posts here.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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Luis Alonso Ramos wrote:
I'm very excited about going to the other side of the world, let's see how it turns up!
Be warned.. everything is upside down on the other side of the world!
Luis Alonso Ramos wrote:
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you too!
David
Never forget: "Stay kul and happy" (I.A.)
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dnh wrote:
Be warned.. everything is upside down on the other side of the world!
Yes, I've noticed that... driving on the wrong side, people in electrical escalators on the wrong side...
Just kidding, there's not such wrong side, only different side 
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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It's Sunday night (11:21 pm) and I've just finished. I've been all day long writing a 38 page long proposal for a software solution for a friend of my dad. He's starting a company that will sell door-to-door little credits for low-income people.
So I had several meetings with him and his partners, and I have a final meeting tomorrow, to turn in my proposal. They're also talking to other software firms, so we'll see how this comes up.
Some part of me is hoping that they choose someone else. It's such a big project that I don't how I'm going to complete it. They want it in two months. My best estimation was that I can have it in three.
But the better part of me, that which loves challenges (and the big bucks), wants it.
I'm going on vacaction this Friday, but hopefully by January when I come back, I'll have an answer. I'll keep you (my lonely ocassional reader, if I have one) informed.
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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I'll try to start blogging here every now and then, and see if someone, even one person, reads this!!
Well, now the real question, what do I write about?
Ah yes, yesterday I had a meeting with my first employee . He's a nice person and seems to be very intelligent. I interviewed him about two weeks ago, and yesterday I gave him his first assignment, he'll develop a little web page for one of my dad's business.
You can check it when it's done at www.topcar.com.mx[^].
Meanwhile I'm working in my first ASP.NET application, and what can I say, I like it! I still prefer writing desktop applications, but I'm learning a lot. I'll keep that for a later post!
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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Luis Alonso Ramos wrote:
I'll try to start blogging here every now and then, and see if someone, even one person, reads this!!
hmm, you'd be surprised how many people read blogs 
Luis Alonso Ramos wrote:
yesterday I gave him his first assignment, he'll develop a little web page for one of my dad's business.
reminds me way how I started... bt it was little asp.net app.
Luis Alonso Ramos wrote:
Meanwhile I'm working in my first ASP.NET application, and what can I say, I like it! I still prefer writing desktop applications, but I'm learning a lot. I'll keep that for a later post!
yeah, ASP.NET is great 
btw take a look at custom (and user) controls, this is great way how to learn a lot about standard ASP.NET webcontrols
and about ASP.NET in general.
David
Never forget: "Stay kul and happy" (I.A.)
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dnh wrote:
reminds me way how I started... bt it was little asp.net app
How did you start? helping someone? o giving someone an assignment? Today he came to take some pictures of the business (I have my office in my dad's business, but mine is a completely independent business).
dnh wrote:
take a look at custom (and user) controls
I've read about them before. I haven't had the need for them yet, but when I do, I know I'll learn a lot.
This new employee of mine was telling me he didn't know much about programming, only a little ASP (but he's good at graphics, something I'm not). I told me that he would have learn a lot by doing different projects, and that I would be happy to help him learn. He seems to like the idea, so probably he'll later (when he finishes school) become someone very valuable to my business.
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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Luis Alonso Ramos wrote:
How did you start? helping someone? o giving someone an assignment?
no. My first work was small web app [edit]I was in similar position as your employee, not in your position [edit]
Luis Alonso Ramos wrote:
but he's good at graphics, something I'm not
ahh, same here... my drawing technique is still the same as it was in first grade of elementary school (no, it's not good technique)
Never forget: "Stay kul and happy" (I.A.)
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dnh wrote:
no. My first work was small web app [edit]I was in similar position as your employee, not in your position [edit]
How did you get it?
I got my first job about four years ago, a friend of my dad required a software to be developed and my dad recommended me. I charged a lot of money, but they were very happy with the result (to the point he is still my client, and currently we're studying and designing a project, that will be close to my limits as a single developer.)
When I finished school last may, I came back to Chihuahua (my city) and started my own little business. I haven't spent a single peso (Mexican currency) in advertising, and still I have more work than I can do. I've had no time to develop my own web page (if this guy comes out as good as it seems, he'll do it for me!)
-- LuisR
Luis Alonso Ramos
Intelectix - Chihuahua, Mexico
Not much here: My CP Blog!
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Now I finally got a little project to give it a try. My findings:
* Simple to use. I used the ADO.NET provider, and it's basically the same as using the OleDb* or SqlDb* clasess. True, I didn't use the most advanced features (mostly DataReaders) but it works good.
* The documentation, for lack of a better word, sucks. The class library documentation, mostly, is something like "GetDate method: gets a date." I was having trouble with an exception when I was trying to connect to the database. You don't pass the filename of the database, but a connection string like "Database=filename.vdb".
* Support. I used the support forums twice. Once I found the answer in a previous thread, and the other time I got a very quick reply, although I had solved the problem myself 5 minutes earlier.
* Different SQL. I had a little trouble with a SELECT statement that works differently that what had worked for me in Access and MSDN. If using wildcards, you must use 'Like' instead of "=" as in "SELECT * FROM Table WHERE FirstName Like = '%blahblah%';"
* Easy to deply. Copy two DLLs and that's it.
Well, that's about it. Overall, I'm very satisfied with it, and it does what it is supposed to very well.
My only requesst is that it would work (or they would tell us how to do it) with OleDb* classes, so migration to MSDE would be as simple as changing the connection string.
I'll keep posting about further experiences.
-- LuisR
___________
Luis Alonso Ramos
Chihuahua, Mexico
www.luisalonsoramos.com
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Great to hear Luis, thanks for posting your comments!
My quick reply is that we are working to improve our docs and we are working to improve the demo application to show off all the features.
Anthony Carrabino
www.vistadb.net
Anthony Carrabino
www.vistadb.net
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vistasoftware wrote:
thanks for posting your comments!
That's the least I could do for getting a free copy, thanks to you.
Yes, your docs really need some improvement. Aside from that, I'm very satisfied overall with the product, as it works flawlessly. Definitely, I would recommend it.
BTW, I can't wait for VistaDB Server. That will be a great replacement for MSDE, too bad it'll take another year to be released.
Keep up the great work!!
-- LuisR
___________
Luis Alonso Ramos
Chihuahua, Mexico
www.luisalonsoramos.com
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Great! The VistaDB Server will be availabe in 7-9 months.
Anthony Carrabino
www.vistadb.net
Anthony Carrabino
www.vistadb.net
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Yesterday after an ill-recieved add on the Lounge, Anthony Carrabino offered me a free copy of VistaDB, and I just got a e-mail from him.
I must say that after wandering through their www.vistadb.net[^], their product seems very promising.
I'll give it a try and post a product review here, and hope it helps someone. That is the least I can do for getting a free copy!!
Thanks Anthony!
-- LuisR
___________
Luis Alonso Ramos
Chihuahua, Mexico
www.luisalonsoramos.com
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Since only I can create a thread here, this one is open for comments by everyone else about whatever comes to mind.
-- LuisR
___________
Luis Alonso Ramos
Chihuahua, Mexico
www.luisalonsoramos.com
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:->
I saw it so late .
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