Database Application Builder

What it is

Database Application Builder is a Windows desktop tool from Longtion Software for creating database applications and web applications without writing code. The product page opens with "You can create database application and Web application with Database Application Builder. It is easy and simple." The version shown is 4.9, the page offers Download and Buy now buttons, and its fact box lists the license as shareware, so this is software you install on a Windows machine rather than a hosted service you log into.

It is for people who need a data-entry, lookup or reporting application on top of a relational database: an office manager who wants a front end for an Access file, or a small IT team that needs forms over an SQL Server or Oracle database without a developer. The product page says you "don't have to be a software programmer" and that the tool "requires no programming knowledge." The company's About page says Longtion Software has been developing software products "for a worldwide client base since 1998" and that its products "are in use by thousands of corporate, government and ISV developers."

What you build and how

The product page names three targets: desktop applications, database applications and web applications, all "without writing any code." The building environment is an integrated development environment (IDE) with drag-and-drop objects, which the page describes as quick to learn and easy to use. You build the user interface by placing objects onto forms.

Connecting to data

This is where the page goes into most detail. Applications built with the tool use ActiveX Data Objects (ADO) to reach database information through OLE DB, and you can also use ODBC. The page lists the databases it can work with. Local databases are Paradox, dBASE, FoxPro and Access; remote database servers are Oracle, Sybase, Informix, Microsoft SQL Server and DB2. Applications can create, restructure, fetch data from and update those databases, and the tool can connect directly to Microsoft Jet OLE Database (Access) files and create database tables.

The page is frank about what that means at deployment time: ADO drivers must be installed on the client computer, and if the application uses an SQL database such as SQL Server or Oracle, that database's client software has to be installed there too. For a buyer, this is useful planning information. A finished desktop application is not a self-contained web link you send around; each machine that runs it needs the right drivers.

Forms, records and logic

The data layer is a set of data-aware objects that represent fields from a database record and, if the dataset allows it, let users edit that data and post changes back to the database. You choose between objects that display and edit plain text, objects for formatted text, objects for graphics and multimedia elements. You can show a single record on screen or list many records in a grid (DBGrid), and users can move through records and add or edit data with a built-in DBNavigator object or with navigation controls you design yourself.

Three features cover the logic most business databases need:

• Master/detail relationships. DBTable datasets can be linked so that the detail records always match the current master record, the classic order-and-order-lines screen.
• Lookup fields. A read-only field that displays a value found in another dataset. The page's example is a mail-order application where an operator types a zip code and the city and state fill in from a zip code table.
• Calculated fields. A field whose value is computed at runtime from other fields, for example a float field derived from two others.

Lookup and calculated fields can be defined on a dataset object, DBQuery or DBTable.

Charts and reports

For analysis, a DBChart object presents database information graphically so users can quickly grasp it. The series types are Line, Area, Point, Bar, Horizontal Bar and Pie, which fits a sales or inventory summary rather than a full BI dashboard.

For printed output you use Report objects, which the page calls visual report design objects. They produce anything from simple banded reports to more complex, highly customized ones, and users can export a report to PDF (.pdf), RichText (.rtf), Excel (.xls) and Text (.txt) files.

Web applications

The web side is the product's most distinctive feature. The page says you build standalone web applications "exactly the same way you would create normal database applications," and that the standalone web application is a web server that runs without depending on any other web server (IIS or Apache). The features list frames this as building web applications for an intranet, your local network. So the realistic use is putting a database front end in colleagues' browsers inside the office, without installing the application on each desk, rather than publishing a public website.

The page also explains why it supports the browser at all: web applications can be updated and maintained without distributing and installing software on client computers, and they work across platforms.

Learning and the wider family

Longtion sells two sibling builders on the same domain, and their pages show how the company's builders work in general. RadBuilder, a general visual application builder, includes 70 built-in object types and a library of ready-to-use form and object templates: you pick a form from the template list or drag an object template onto a form. Its page explains the event model, where an event such as OnClick has actions attached; the example is a button called Button1. Longtion Application Builder includes more than 70 built-in object types. These are separate products, so the template library and the object count belong to them.

The RadBuilder tutorials page lists an overview, installation, and guides to creating an application, a database application, a report, a chart and a web application. It also lists step-by-step tutorials in 3 parts numbered 1 to 14, a database application series in 3 parts numbered 1 to 15, and demo projects including a database demo, an animations demo, an ebook and a web demo. Those tutorials cover the same tasks the Database Application Builder page describes, which makes them a reasonable starting point for a new user.

Plans, platform and support

Pricing is simple. The company's products page lists Database Application Builder at USD $99, RadBuilder at USD $299 and Longtion Application Builder at USD $399. Each product has a single listed price, with no subscription tiers, user counts or usage limits on the page. The product page lists the license as shareware, so you can download it before you buy.

The fact box on the product page gives the rest: version 4.9, platform Windows 2000/XP/2003/2008/Vista/7/8/10/11, language English, and a 2.8MB download. The About page lists support@longtion.com and sales@longtion.com as contact addresses. The page's own description of the tool is "easy and simple"; that is the company's wording, and the pages offer no customer quotes or reviews alongside it.

Who it suits and who it does not

This suits someone who wants a conventional database front end on Windows: forms that edit records, master/detail screens, lookups, printable and exportable reports, charts, and an intranet web version of the same application. It also suits anyone sitting on an existing Access, SQL Server or Oracle database who wants screens over it without hiring a developer, and who prefers paying a listed price once over managing a subscription. At USD $99 it is the lowest-priced of the three builders on Longtion's products page.

The caveats come from the page itself. The tool is a Windows install, desktop deployments need database drivers on each client computer, and the web option is framed for an intranet. Anyone after a hosted, browser-based builder will find a different model here: this is an installed Windows IDE in the tradition of classic database tools.