Web Application Maker Philosophy

WAM encourages IS project investment in the SQL database layer, pushing the main added value of a development project from the effervescent web GUI platform to where it should belong - into the more stable software platform, the relational database. 

To avoid hard scripting at the web server and browser layers, WAM provides model-driven development, based on a declarative model based on SQL Servers built-in meta-data plus the WAMmodel tables; the WAM whole meta-model is simply the data engine built-in meta-data (data dictionary, relationship graph, view definitions, user permissions, constraints, stored procedure signatures) plus a few additional tables with no redundant information - the WAMmodel. 

WAM acts like a runtime "function" that can either determine a whole "default" web interface automatically, or provide functional GUI fragments on demand, through a high level (ASP) developer API:

Web interface = WAM(Database Meta Information + WAMmodel) + Custom-made ASP pages 

These fragments are inspired by high-level database concepts, and can get automatically assembled into single click/code-free full database front-ends. By running WAM's installer, which simply copies its runtime code to a web server and runs a generic SQL setup script on a target database, this gets immediately a functional, multi-user profile web application front-end, with zero lines of code. This can then be refined and maintained over several development axis: 

• Simple individual end-user preference editing, by letting early users themselves define preferences, such as list joins (including picking unlimited master-> detail and detail->master fields), ordering and search criteria, which can then be copied to other users
• Editing the WAMmodel tables either directly or through the WAMAdmin utility and its "application edition mode", which allow direct navigation from page elements to relevant WAMmodel records

(the above improvements can be demonstrated and tried at the online showroom)

• Improving the SQL database structure and (database resident) logic
• Tuning SQL security permissions, which affect the interface navigational and operational structure
• Writing specific Active Server Pages, using the available APIs plus WAM objects

Previous web interface generators clash against the inevitable need to fine-tune parts of the application; WAM addresses this problem by providing high level WAM objects that generate interface fragments at runtime, intermixed with the developer code, and not just at "developer/wizard" time as in other tools. These objects make ASP code more concise and robust to database changes because they dynamically introspect the WAMmodel; transparent caching mechanisms make this feasible.

Back to WAM

 Declarativa - Serviços de Informática, Lda.
  www.declarativa.com, info@declarativa.com  fax: +351-22-030-1511  tel: +351-22-030-1580
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