PowerBuilder Web Forms Applications

The PowerBuilder Web Forms solution employs ASP.NET technology. It has a three-tier architecture, with the browser client as the front end, and the PowerBuilder components on the IIS server as the middle tier. The database tier remains unchanged.

Moving an existing application from client-server architecture to three-tier Web architecture typically requires a significant effort in modifying the application code and the tolerance of various functionality restrictions due to constraints of the Web environment. The PowerBuilder .NET Web Forms solution is intended to ease the deployment of existing client-server applications to the Web and allow you to use your PowerBuilder skills to create new Web applications.

You must take into account the Internet bandwidth available, the rendering capability of client Web browsers, and IIS server environment factors when determining whether .NET Web Forms are an optimal solution for new or existing applications.

• System Requirements for PowerBuilder Web Forms
  You must install the .NET Framework 4.0 on the same computer as PowerBuilder. The system PATH environment variable must include the location of the .NET Framework.
• Web Forms Targets
  Use the .NET Web Forms Application target wizard to create a Web Forms target “from scratch” or from an existing PowerBuilder application.
• Web Forms Projects
  Whether you use the .NET Web Forms target wizard to create a new target from scratch or from an existing application, the target wizard always creates a new project. It automatically launches the .NET Web Forms Application project wizard.
• Web Forms Deployment
  When a .NET Web Forms project is open in the Project painter and no other painters are open, you can select Design > Deploy Project from the Project painter to deploy the project.
• Sharing Data Across Sessions
  You can share the data from primary, delete, and filter buffers of read-only DataWindow objects across Web Forms application sessions.
• Registry Functions for Web Forms Applications
  PowerBuilder Web Forms applications can read registry entries at the server side and can write registry entries to a registry.xml file.