Hi there,
Is a web app always preferable to a ‘real’ app?
- or are there times when a real app should be used?
I’m starting a new app and can’t decide which would be best.
Is Ruby (not RoR) suitable for a real app?
Chris.
Chris: you have to tell us more about this app you want us to build
before we can tell you which is more suitable…
I agree - the system that I am doing right now involves both a “real”
app (to capture data from physical equipment connected over serial
ports) and a “web” app that makes the information available to the whole
wide (authorized) world!
Cheers
Mohit.
chris <cptfinch@…> writes:
My 2 cents; I think this is not so much a question about language as it
is about
which GUI toolkit to use with Ruby, to me, Ruby is almost a given 
(OK, I could write some tight loop somewhere in C, just to be called
from Ruby).
There are ruby bindings for many GUI toolkits, for example QT(not free
on
windows) http://developer.kde.org/language-bindings/ruby/index.html or
WxWidgets(free),
http://raa.ruby-lang.org/project/wxruby/
Also I would almost go as far as consider Ajax web toolkits like
prototype
windows etc. just new GUI toolkits where platform is a browser (or Flash
for
that matter, but again the tools for Flash aren’t free, except for
OpenLaszlo).
The main difference, imo, is still the ease of use that these
traditional GUI
libraries provide, at least for now the traditional toolkits like QT are
a lot
quicker to put a complicated GUI together than in Ajax, especially when
using
tools like the QT designer, than any of the Ajax tools I seen.
If you want to see what can be done with web ruby Ajax, I put together a
quick
demo that includes many of the traditional app features, but on the web.
This
has movable windows, drag-drop items, “push” updates, in-place edits, on
the fly
stylesheet changing etc., you can see a a screenshot on my blog and
follow a
link(when it’s up):
Ville Maanpaa on weekdays: Ajax
So, think about your target audience and the importance of speed in
development(budget) to pick a GUI to use, Ruby is definetely suitable
for real
apps 
Ville Maanpaa
Tom A. wrote:
Chris: you have to tell us more about this app you want us to build
before we can tell you which is more suitable…
The app I want to build is
- the user selects scientfic measurements from the database that they
want. - the user selects how they want it presented e.g. a line graph or table
- the user is able to get a CSV file with the data as well.
can i do all this in a web application?
Chris
On 8/8/06, Chris F. [email protected] wrote:
Tom A. wrote:
Chris: you have to tell us more about this app you want us to build
before we can tell you which is more suitable…
You can do this in a web app. It could be much more convienient for
your
users too.
The app I want to build is
- the user selects scientfic measurements from the database that they
want.
Done easily with a web app if it’s as simple as ticking boxes, radio
buttons, select boxes, auto -complete boxes etc.
- the user selects how they want it presented e.g. a line graph or table
Very simple to do. Gruff graphs is a good package, but since you’ve
suggested there is scientific data to plot, perhaps gnuplot would be a
better option (if you can handle the licence)
http://rubyforge.org/projects/rgplot/
- the user is able to get a CSV file with the data as well.
This is very simple. There are many examples of this on the list if you
search for them. A lot would be regarding exporting to excel. I think
there are some examples on the rails wiki site as well.
can i do all this in a web application?
Chris F. wrote:
- the user is able to get a CSV file with the data as well.
can i do all this in a web application?
Chris
Assuming that the measurements have somehow turned up in the database,
the rest can all be done from a web app (and we really need to stop
calling client computer-based apps as “real” apps - web apps are just as
real 
)
Cheers
Mohit.
On 8/8/06, Mohit S. [email protected] wrote:
want.
- the user selects how they want it presented e.g. a line graph or table
- the user is able to get a CSV file with the data as well.
can i do all this in a web application?
Chris
Assuming that the measurements have somehow turned up in the database,
the rest can all be done from a web app (
I have written a data collection app for my company, and it is all done
from
within rails.
This app either asks for a file to be uploaded or gets one from the file
system depending on the options selected. The data can be put into the
db
from within rails if you want. Obviously the file needs to be on the
server
machine or at least accesible by it for the file system option to work.
Theres a plugin available now (the name escapes me) that will do bulk
imports, and there’s always the option of just using the (insert adapter
of
choice here ) in a class that is not inheriting ARql if you really want.
That can be quite fast, especially if you have data that is of a
consistent
format.
Whether or not it’s suitable / desireable to do the data import in rails
is
another story… but it can be done.
Thanks everyone - this RoR is unbeleivably good!
Daniel N wrote:
>> >file system depending on the options selected. The data can be put
Whether or not it’s suitable / desireable to do the data import in
rails is another story… but it can be done.
I agree with you 
Actually, my point was not related to “importing” data from files, etc.
What I was getting at was that the scientific measurements may be coming
from a physical instrument which may be connected to a PC of some sort.
In that case, you would need client software to read from, say, a serial
port and load data into the database.
There are many ways to do this, including:
- C/C++ software writes data directly to the DB
- C/C++ software posts data to the Rails web app
- A Ruby software uses ActiveRecord/ Rails to load the data into the
database - …
(I’m using #2 for my system.)
But, all I wanted to say was that if the data was in the database
(through manual entry, one of the schemes above, import as you
suggested, etc.) all the other things that the OP wanted to do could
very well be done from a web app! (Didn’t mean to suggest that the
option of using a web app for putting data into the DB did not exist)
Cheers
Mohit.
Define “bulk upload”
What’s the name of the bulk upload plugin? It’d be very useful
Thanks
Chris
On 8/9/06, Jarod R. [email protected] wrote:
What’s the name of the bulk upload plugin? It’d be very useful
Thanks
Chris
You can see what the plugin does here at the blog
http://blogs.mktec.com/zdennis/articles/category/ruby
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