Clarion 7

Yes, you read correctly. My journey with Clarion I feel is over, and with that comes most of my desire to keep this blog running.

What do you think Clarion7.com is worth? Well, this doesn’t receive much traffic, but it does own the no.1 spot for all Clarion 7 related keywords. Not only that, the Clarion Worldwide users map is pretty well populated, which is a pretty decent feature that runs itself.

What is included in the sale?

• The Clarion7.com domain
• The blog along with all its design and content
• The Clarion Worldwide Users Map - this is a 3rd party plugin run by FMAtlas

I’ll also help in the migration of this blog to another server if the new owner intends on keeping this blog.

Asking price? I’m not 100% sure. I do feel that it is a great domain to own and could easily be used to sell a decent number of 3rd Party apps for Clarion 7 - when it eventually is released! Maybe have a look at my main blog for a hint on the Buying price that I would easily settle for.

Post a comment here or send me an email at jason [at] jasonbagley [dot] com.

(Firstly, sorry about posting this ugly graphic on my blog, but it forms the basis of the post.)

So, put your hands up those of you that think Clarion is 10 times faster at building applications? Yes? Ok, wait… actually, the real question is, 10 times faster than what? Turbo Pascal? Delphi? Java? Aaaah.. maybe, no wait… are you perhaps thinking its .Net?! (Shame on you…)

Well, you all wrong. You can build applications 10 times faster than…. Clarion. Yes, that’s it! Clarion can build applications 10 times faster than itself. Cool hey!

Hello Jason.

“10 times faster using Clarion templates code generation as compared to hand coding”

Regards,

Michael R. Williams, Sales Manager
SoftVelocity, Inc.

So it looks like you are able to get your hands on Clarion.Net now - well the Beta version for a small fee. Exciting hey? Only if $1800 is something you don’t blink an eyelid for. And that price is going up at the end of November 2007, so hurry!

Or wait, pricing for Clarion 7 is also out. How does $2000 smell for Enterprise? Ok, lets not worry about Clarion 7 because it isn’t available yet. But what we can talk about is paying $1800 to try out a Beta version of a development tool that you might or might not like.

Does SV and the Clarion community want more Clarion developers? The way I see it, is that Clarion wants to remain a tight nit community, without any outside interference. No new developers, no youngsters, no entry.

If I was fresh out of college, looking to gain some experience, I’d be able to develop for free in C#. I’d be able to develop a website using ASP.Net, for free. I could hook up a database to both of these languages, for free. And then once I’ve realised, “Hell, I could make money from this”. I could then start selling my freely developed applications and once I have made some money, realise my customers want some added functionality that my free development tools don’t offer and head on over to Amazon and purchase Visual Studio Standard Edition for $250.

I know there are tons of people that are going to say that SV can’t afford to offer anything for free. Well that’s the exact reason why there is this big fat gate around the Clarion community. (What about trial versions? Not even that exists.)

SV’s new website

So SV are developing Clarion.Net, that can create ASP.Net applications. So why is their new site written in static Html?

I had a look at the feature tour of Clarion 7 and am really disappointed in what the application looks like. They now have all the tools to make one really sexy IDE that could sell itself, yet the icons, fonts and layout of some of the screens look very “amatuerish”. Ok, it is still in Beta, but anyone willing to take a bet it will stay that way?

This post doesn’t really flow that well, but I had to get all my points across. I know I have upset some of the hardcore Clarion supporters, and so be it. One thing I can say is that I think Clarion.Net could be a killer software development tool, but with what I am seeing with regards to marketing the tool, all SV are trying to do is convert existing Clarion developers to start developing in Clarion.Net. That also leads them onto a very dangerous road, because you now playing ball with Microsoft, and the chances of some of your beloved Clarion developers jumping over the gated wall are pretty good. What is outside you ask? The .Net world, which is moving at a pace way to quick for Clarion to ever keep up with. Who is doing things 10 times faster now?

And isn’t that the one golden rule in software development? If you stop learning, you going to get left behind.

Just a quick post and a question for my 3 readers. What is the youngest Clarion developer you know?

I’m 23, and have been programming in Clarion for 2 years now (Although things are going to be changing, but more on that some other time). At our Clarion User Group in Somerset West (near Cape Town), I am the youngest by a couple of years. If I take the average age of our members / mailing list, out of the 20 so developers, the average age is above 30, actually more like 35.

Yes, Clarion started way back in 1986 (when I was just 2!), and has come a long way since then, so obviously there are a number of “not-so-young” developers, which is why the average is around 35. But I honestly think that for Clarion to carry on and not fade into infinity, younger developers need to get into and “sell” Clarion.

2 Questions

1: What is the age of the youngest Clarion developer you know?
2: How many Clarion developers in their 20’s do you know?

1: Me! I’m 23.
2: I know of 3 developers in their 20’s.

I am not trying to offend anyone, irrespective of age / race / development language. If you are offended by this blog and my writing, I am not forcing you to read it! I just love having intelligent and though-provoking debates!

Install Clarion7, run it, then this happens:

Ok, Click report error to SoftVelocity:

Oh boy. We still have a long way to go until the final release of Clarion 7!

So SV has secretly released Clarion.NET to its alpha testers. Seems that no-one is supposed to know but there are always folk that will let it slip - especially if they need help.

I was trolling the SV forums when I came across this post - DataGrid Control for Clarion.Net.

Enlarge by clicking on the thumbnail

By the looks of it you need a small workaround in the Clarion 7 IDE to get it to use the Clarion.NET compiler. Are there any of you alpha testers out there that will confirm this release? (I bet not!)

The Aussie Devcon has just completed with tons of demos and information about Clarion 7 and Clarion.net. Bob Z from Soft Velocity gave a couple of demo’s of the power of the new IDE and the new versions of Clarion.

As always Clarionmag have notes and info on the conference. You can read the opening session notes for free. Some of the things that are covered in the article are:

• The new IDE
• Clarion.net and Winforms
• Clarion.net Webapps
• Mobile Apps
• the new dictionary editor
• Data diagrammer
• the infamous appgen - which wasn’t demo’ed as “there is still alot of work to be done to it“

The closing session is behind the paywall, but there are more notes (more of a wrap-up) which is also free to view. Pimpmyclarion.com by Stu has some on-the-ground notes. Not much info yet, but hopefully he will post a couple of decent follow up posts.

Bob Z did say that we will be seeing a Clarion 7 release this year. But what the Devcon showed was that Clarion 7 and Clarion.net is in development, but it also showed that there is a lot of work still to be done, and I still stand by my prediction for the Clarion 7 release date.

It is almost the middle of May, which means that in 5 and a half months since the beginning of 2007, we have seen very little Clarion 7 movement. Yes we have seen some sketchy details on C7 being released in “phases” and that at the end of March, Phase 1 was nearing completion, but that was it.

I have heard a couple of people receiving emails from Soft Velocity’s “sales department”, urging users to buy the subscription plan that will include a Clarion 7 upgrade. But don’t reply and ask for dates, because you ain’t getting any.

Another thing that is slightly upsetting (with regards to C7) is development on C6.3 is still actively happening, with the latest patch 9056 being released on the 5th of May. This only means that SV developers are NOT working on C7 when they are working on C6.3.

My estimated arrival date of Clarion 7 is nowhere near 2007. Based on the vibes coming from SV, I can’t see anything being released within the next couple of months. Which means my estimate is sometime in 2008.

So my estimated Clarion 7 release date is 12 August 2008.

Yes that’s right folks. Stop thinking 2007 is the year of Clarion 7. Rather focus your energy on the arrival date of 2009, and when it arrives on the 12 August 2008, it will have been released 4 months early!

A couple of weeks ago I added a new feature to this site - Worldwide Clarion users. It is an interactive Google map that any Clarion user can edit and add themselves to!

So if you are a Clarion user or have used Clarion before, please head over to the map and click on the contribute to the map link and add yourself. Just please remember to make the title of the marker your name, and add what versions of Clarion you have used or are currently using. Click on my marker (Jason Bagley) to see an example of how I would like your marker to look like.

I’m really hoping we get as many Clarion developers on the map as possible. So don’t be shy!

It’s official folks, Strategy Online has released the first Clarion 7 compatible accessory, J-Spell!

Install it on Clarion 6.3 along with the J-Spell C7 binaries. Do the magic conversion for Clarion 7 and there you have the world’s first Clarion 7 supported accessory!

In other less interesting news, Soft Velocity have announced that Phase 1 of the Clarion 7 roll out is complete. Phase 2 is going to start soon, so that officially means we are currently in the middle of nowhere. Phase 2 was supposed to support the new dictionary editor, but there was no mention of that, only mention of Unicode and Clear Type fonts support. Lovely.