Paradox and ADO?

[rmcmorris]

Does anyone know how to use ActiveX Data Objects using ObjectPal? I can use ADO in all of Microsoft's apps to do work in Paradox, but I would like to use ADO in Paradox. Right now I use ODBC connections from Paradox, but they are a hassle to maintain. I end up setting up the ODBC aliases for users each time I do a new install.

Any advice on how to programaticlly setup ODBC connections would also be useful.

It just seems that Corel would want to build in some ADO capability to allow Paradox to easily talk to other apps.

Thanks,

Regan

 

[footpad]

Regan,

In my experience, this is probably best done as a separate module written in Delphi or C++ Builder, both of which feature native ADO support, and then linked to your Paradox application as a DLL or other appropriate interface.

While I personally agree that ADO support would be a nice enhancement, I believe Corel would have to replace Paradox's use of the now-frozen BDE with some other technology. That would be a huge undertaking, one that would probably take a few years to pull of completely.

Not much of answer, but I still hope it helps...

-- Lance

 

[rmcmorris]

Yet it seems that Microsoft is able to use BDE with ADO to tap into Paradox tables quite nicely. I thought that ADO was supposed to be a universal code for cross-application use, so I guess I do not understand why BDE would necessarily have to be trashed in Paradox.

 

[footpad]

Regan,

Well, this is my personal belief, based on what I recall from the older days of Pdoxwin, but...

Primarily because Paradox was literally the first BDE client. Much of the initial PDOXWIN code was written while BDE was still called OGEL (LEGO backwards; it's original internal codename) and there are many bits that are twined into direct DLL calls instead of the final API.

I suspect one of the reasons why Corel hasn't already replaced Paradox's reliance on BDE with one based on ADO/RDO/whatever comes from the amount of work needed to retool the package to be API agnostic.

In any event, it's certainly possible to use Paradox for ODBC datasources. You just can't (yet) use the ADO API/Object layer, unless you're working with a set of tools that already support that, e.g. Delphi, C++ Builder, etc.

Given that ObjectPAL contains very limited support for passing pointers and/or structures to external DLL's, I strongly suspect that the best way to hook into the advantages of ADO is to create a DLL that does the hard work that ObjectPAL can't support.

Still, at least it's possible. Thats something, at any rate...
-- Lance

 

[rmcmorris]

I do use ODBC quite extensively in my Paradox apps currently, but it requires a lot of user setup. I like ADO because I can code in all of the requirements without needing to bother the user.

Maybe what I need to do is to learn how to programatically setup the ODBC sources....

Regan