Andromeda Database Development System / News: Recent posts

The Andromeda Team has decided to start using Google Code to organize andromeda development. All Open Bug Reports have been moved over and Feature Requests/SVN is in the process of moving.

Moving forware please use http://code.google.com/p/andro to submit issues.

The Andromeda demos have both been upgraded, see them at http://www.andromeda-project.org/thedemo.html.

In addition, in the last 2 days about 15 visual glitches in our admin screens have been updated.

A new release was made today, use your Node manager to upgrade to the latest.

A second demo program has been added to show off Andromeda's features. This demo will receive progressive updates over the next few weeks, and all instances will be preserved so that programmers can compare. The multiple instances of this demo will allow developers to see what kind of features can be added over a particular time frame.

http://www.andromeda-project.org/thedemo.html

Andromeda now has a new install package for Windows, along with new streamlined and simpler instructions.

The Andromeda team is proud to announce the availability of Andromeda Version 1 Release Candidate 1.

Andromeda is a programmer productivity tool, our motto is, "the fastest easiest way to get it done, get it right." Andromeda features an innovative data dictionary that dramatically reduces application programming, as well as various screen generation routines and the ability to override or modify framework behavior at any level.... read more

Andromeda today received significant documentation updates.

1) The entire Database Programming section is finished - Andromeda's most important feature.

2) A complete section on Database Access has been added.

3) A complete section on modifying the "free" admin screens has been added.

4) Upgrade scripts have been documented.

5) A new section on using x6 plugins has been started and about 1/2 completed.... read more

The documentation at www.andromeda-project.org has received two significant updates today. The docs now contain a complete description of Andromeda automations, which are crucial to making full use of Andromeda. As well, the docs now contain a full description of how to assign security.

Much has happened:

1) The docs now have a complete description of our basic data definition for table structures. Next up is automations.

2) Docs now use javascript syntax colorizing.

3) Several corrections to the "Web Programming" pages were made.

4) Links in Andromeda now go to the new docs

5) the docs themselves have a completely new look, much cleaner and easier, and each page is now static, so they load faster.... read more

1) Fixed issue with app_nopage() on x6 pages, which caused non-root users to keep jumping back to the menu.

2) Fixed issue with user assignments to groups in x6 mode.

3) In the "Embarrassing" file, I was not saving the changes to the default download, so the past couple of releases have been giving the user the May 24th file. Ouch! But that is fixed.

As of today, Andromeda is now in a feature freeze to prepare for Release 1. All features in the original vision are in place.

Focus now will be on documentation and bug fixes.

Two long-awaited features for the builder: errors in yaml processing now give line #'s, and duplicate entries are trapped and reported. Bonus features include allow 'property: Y' and no longer requiring 'property: "Y"', and skipping a prescan to speed up the build.

Today's release relaxes case-sensitivity requirements in the .dd.yaml file, and fixes a false error report if you have values to preload to a table in your .dd.yaml, and a link on the Node Manager that was broken by the docs purge has been fixed.

We now have all core Andromeda features developed, and only two or three remaining for a single commercial customer. All attention is now focused on bug fixes, documentation, and the demo. Stay tuned!

Yesterday's release had a bug. After you installed and downloaded you'd get a PHP failure and be dead.

Workaround: download today's release and untar it, go through Andromeda install again. About 10 minutes.

JQUERY Integration! The Andromeda team has decided to go with the very elegant and powerful JQuery system for our browser-side features. Effectively immediately new browser-side features will be implemented with JQuery plugins.
Docs here: http://www.andromeda-project.org/pages/cms/JQuery+Integration.html

New Documentation on how we make use of Joomla tempates: http://www.andromeda-project.org/pages/cms/Andromeda+HTML+Templates.html... read more

We (finally) have a public demo program:

http://www.andromeda-project.org/demo

Andromeda is now updated so that the build will work in Postgresql 8.3. Postgresql has for years supported many implicit typecasts, but has changed their mind and decided not to do that anymore, so we have updated the builder code not to need implicit type casts.

I've gone through and fixed about half a dozen small annoyances that were causing issues for first time installers. Most of these were typos a user might figure out themselves, or would fix themselves if you reran a process, but by getting rid of them the overall install should now be quite smooth.

Our build had a problem loading content from YAML files, which introduced a bug in the installer. This has been fixed.

Syntax coloring files have been added to our Sourceforge repository:

https://andro.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/andro/trunk/syntax_coloring/jedit/

These files are for the jEdit editor, which runs on all platforms. In Linux you would put these file into ~/.jedit/modes.

We have also added a permanent documentation page for syntax coloring:

http://www.andromeda-project.org/pages/cms/Syntax+Coloring.html

Upgrade scripts are a new feature now available in Andromeda that allow you to run snippets of code at the end of upgrades.

Building databases is central to what Andromeda is all about. The build process was the first Andromeda program written, and is still the most important. It creates tables, columns, indexes and triggers. What the build program does not do is execute any kind of special actions you may need to move data around to populate new tables or columns. That is where the scripts come in.... read more

Feedback from yesterday's SVN feature revealed we needed to make a way to update Andromeda itself for people who are not Andromeda hackers. This is done. The install program also points to the new andro.dd.yaml file instead of the old andro.add file.

The Andromeda team is very happy to announce that we have simplified and corrected the installation instructions specifically for Ubuntu Version 7.10, aka "Gutsy Gibbon".

The revised instructions group tasks together by user context, so that all command-line commands come first, followed by file edits, then server restarts, program configs, and finally the Andromeda configuration itself. These instructions do not expect you to be a Linux guru, and they follow completely the conventions for other instructions you will find on Ubuntu forums.... read more

SVN Downloads Drafted

The Andromeda Team is proud to announce the addition of code that allows downloading of new software versions from SVN repositories. This allows an enterprise develpment effort to handle all source control with SVN up to the time of generating a release, and then Andromeda can pull the release from the SVN repository.

One of the earliest elements of the original Andromeda vision was Enterprise-level code management. This means Andromeda must elegantly and easily find the latest versions of applications, download them to servers, and be able to build multiple instances of an application on a server, even multiple instances at different versions.... read more

Great software begins with a great installation. At the same time, bad software begins and ends with a bad installation experience. For some time the Andromeda team has been aware that certain small but significant bugs existed in the Andromeda installer that were probably bringing many downloads to a short end.

We are happy to announce that we have fixed two major glitches in the installation process and we hope to see a much smoother experience going forward. The reference installation was done on Ubuntu 7.10 and we were able to obtain flawless installs.... read more