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DBMS Tools for Web Intergration: Pour It On!

By Barry Nance Assigning an expert database programmer to a Web site creation-and-maintenance project is akin to having a housepainter show up everyday to touch up nicks and scrapes on your walls. Given the variety of paint and painting methods, and the fact that learning how to wield a paintbrush is easy, bringing in a professional to handle such tasks would be a waste of his skills and your money. The same goes for hiring a programmer to create and maintain your Web site.

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More flavors of database tools exist than there are shades of white housepaint. This is fortunate, because you need to assemble a range of tools for relational database management systems (RDBMSes)--query tools, schema design tools, replication tools, monitoring tools, optimization tools, security tools. A relatively new and popular category of database tools is Web-oriented. The latest versions of RDBMS products from IBM Corp., Microsoft Corp.and Oracle Corp. include software aids for incorporating database content into Web pages; many third-party software vendors also offer similar tools for your database toolbox.

We evaluated these Web-database integration tools on an intranet consisting of Pentium Pro-based NT Server 4.0 machines, an Ethernet LAN running TCP/IP and a variety of clients (Windows NT, Windows 95, OS/2 Warp and Macintosh System 7). In each case, we connected via Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) or native interface to Oracle7.3, SQL Server 6.5 and DB2 Universal Database 5.0.

Tools for accessing a database in a Web environment differ in three key aspects: database interface, Web server interface and visual design environment. In our evaluation of the current crop of da tabase and Web integration tools, we examined carefully the extent and quality of code generation, we looked closely at how the product's user interface helped build Web pages containing database content, and we tested the variety of presentation options for database material. To get top marks, a product needed to exhibit several characteristics: native connectivity to the major databases and ODBC connectivity to all other databases; NSAPI, ISAPI, WRBAPI and CGI connectivity to Web servers; production of robust, uncrashable JavaScript, VBScript and Java code; no-programming-required, drag-and-drop construction of database-oriented Web pages and associated software; and the ability to display database contents in table, list and single-entry formats.

The following eight toolsets were reviewed: Bluestone Software's Sapphire/Web 4.0; Borland International's IntraBuilder; EveryWare Development Corp.'s Tango Enterprise; IBM's Net.Data; Microsoft's Active Server Pages technology, Web Assistant and Visual Interd ev; Oracle's Developer/2000; Prolifics' Prolifics 2.0; and Sybase's NetImpact Dynamo. In addition, we reviewed two mainframe-oriented tools to help you Web-enable legacy applications--Host Publishing System from Attachmate Corp. and InfoSession from PLATINUM technology (see "Mainframe Tools for Web Database Access," on page 60).

Of the tools we evaluated, Bluestone's Sapphire/Web stood out for its clean, intuitive interface and excellent code generation, and it earns our Editor's Choice award. Not to be easily outdone, Borland's low-cost IntraBuilder exhibited a rich, yet right-to-the-point interface and comprehensive database support; we give it our Best Value commendation. However, all of the tools reviewed had strong points that merit your consideration.

Bluestone Software Sapphire/Web 4.0
Sapphire/Web connected to more databases and Web servers, generated more robust code in mo re languages, and offered easier-to-use drag-and-drop creation of Web pages containing database material than any other product we reviewed. It's a winner.

A full-featured development environment for Web-based programming, Sapphire/Web made short work of creating a complex, robust, database-oriented Web application in our testing. Particularly impressive in our lab-based workout were Sapphire/Web's code-generation wizards. Depending on whether we selected Java Framework or ActiveX Framework, these programming robots emitted Java, ActiveX components, JavaScript and VBScript for us. The generated code was the most robust of all the code produced. Additionally, Bluestone says it's continually producing new wizards and improving existing ones.

To download an Adobe Acrobat .pdf format version of DBMS Tools features charts, click here.