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TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

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    #16
    Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

    I think there is too much wasted screen real estate with the tabbed ui. I'd love to see Alpha come up with an alternative solution. It is a nice control for embedding simple components, but once you go beyond simple you lose a lot of very valuable screen real estate.

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      #17
      Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

      TabbedUI's work for me and I use panel navigators/layouts and cards on tabs a lot! Example screen shot shows a screen using an accordian tab control consuming 30% of the lateral space. The remaining 70% has a panel navigator using a tab band control which in this case caters for 7 different modules.

      2017-12-07_21-45-37.png
      Glen Schild



      My Blog

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        #18
        Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

        The UX is a super Control, the TabbedUI, is a controlled control, there is nothing the UX cannot either host or be hosted by, the UX provides the tools you need to be unconstrained. Do not try to emulate a UI, create your own.
        Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
        Albert Einstein, (attributed)
        US (German-born) physicist (1879 - 1955)

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          #19
          Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

          I know this discussion has arguments on both sides and from many different people who have either adopted the tabbedui to fit their needs or gone out and developed their own solution, but here is my two cents.

          Alpha has grown from a small developer solution to an enterprise offering. It's just my opinion but in order to thrive in this new environment things need to look considerably better out of the box and with less effort. That is one of the main selling points of using an RAD tool. I don't have to reinvent the wheel and can focus on my database and application specific logic, while the stuff that happens in every application is abstracted to a higher level.

          Perhaps our use case for Alpha is different, we have 1 customer and 100's of applications. Each application should have a common and consistent look and feel that is provided without having to repeat that effort for each new application. I see the difference between us and those who have many customers/clients and each client has specific requirements about the look and feel of the application.

          I think it is a worthwhile discussion for the long term viability of the web application component of Alpha. They are doing excellent work on the mobile side and I don't really have too many issues with that specific subset of Alpha Anywhere. As stated, I see viable use cases for the tabbedUI whereby it can be used to maintain small tables such as your lookup and supporting tables. The thing I struggle with most is that I don't always see it as "the" solution for every web application but my experience with the tool and lack of web application samples and training videos make the effort to find a different solution very challenging.

          If your contribution is simply to tell me it's a flexible product and you can do whatever you want, then that is certainly one opinion on the solution. However, myself and others have continued to push for a better presentation of Web Applications developed using Alpha and I think that some effort here will go a long way in retaining current customers and obtaining new enterprise customers. I've used many RAD tools, Alpha being the latest. I know what I am asking has been done by other frameworks and many would concur without diminishing the power and greatness of Alpha Anywhere that there is a fair amount of room for improvement. I know they have a highly skilled staff who do this work with a passion to make the company and product stand out from everyone else, so this is not an attempt to in any way take away from that but rather a plea to address a very important component of the Alpha suite that would give many a huge improvement in the products they develop.

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            #20
            Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

            I think it's funny that no environment is complete on all fronts. Alpha has the power, tools, and framework to build good applications quickly... but still allows you under the hood to easily use client-side and server-side code. However, it looks dated. You have to put as much, or more, time into getting a modern looking UI out of it. You can certainly use BootStrap and similar tools, but whatever time you saved building your app will now be spent on how it looks.

            Other tools I've used are incredible for their choice of Web and Mobile designs... they're up to date and easy to use. And building fairly simple applications is easy. But try to go further and, once again, you'll spend all the time you saved on the UI trying to figure out how to get stuff done that was amazingly simple in Alpha.

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              #21
              Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

              Well said David.

              At this time, even minor changes would be nice as a good faith showing that Alpha won't be a mobile only toolset in 3 years.

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                #22
                Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                I can't really see a mobile only toolset. Pretty much every mobile app needs an web admin back end. One is as important as the other.

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                  #23
                  Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                  I agree with DK on that as well, commercial users in the office need the big box - field techs the phone/tablet. I think this will only solidify over time as best practices in the business world.
                  NWCOPRO: Nuisance Wildlife Control Software My Application: http://www.nwcopro.com "Without forgetting, we would have no memory at all...now what was I saying?"

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                    #24
                    Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                    I run a transportation company on a desktop browser application that uses a tabbed UI. So I am my only client so far. The tabbed UI has been great, and I'm not giving it up any time soon. But I recently started developing mobile components, such as a driver app so drivers can get all the information they need by installing an app on a phone or tablet. I continue to be amazed at the power and ease that Alpha provides, that allow me to create applications the work that way I want them to work. However, the more I work with mobile development, the more I see a hybrid app in my future that works on both a desktop browser and a mobile device. Then I would only have one project to work on and maintain.
                    Last edited by Pizzadude; 12-10-2017, 11:22 AM.

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                      #25
                      Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                      I was attempting to edit my previous post, and wound up with an additional post. Can't figure out how to delete it... dang computers!
                      Last edited by Pizzadude; 12-10-2017, 11:23 AM.

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                        #26
                        Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                        I think eventually what is mobile and what is desktop will become one framework and alpha won’t be far behind. Take a look at many frameworks my favorite is AngularUI that is good on mobile and desktop. It will come to a point for the hardware and software vendors to have one product that will work with different platforms. Then all will be happy.
                        thanks for reading

                        gandhi

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                        http://www.alphawebprogramming.blogspot.com
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                          #27
                          Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                          Agree 100% with Jeremy's and David K's comments above (#'s 19-22).

                          Alpha has put 99.9% of their effort into mobile at the expense of the web side. Even Alpha's showcase demos form various customers almost always have a web component. ALL of my clients have internal web applications. And it needs to look good out of the box. And one theme won't do it either. It should be as simple as selecting a bootstrap theme from a dropdown box.

                          And if they really want to be on the cutting edge, provide grids/lists/forms as responsive CSS. Build once, one form-factor: applicable to browser, tablet and phone w/o any extra design required. Resize the screen and instantly/dynamically adapt. Others are doing this.
                          Peter
                          AlphaBase Solutions, LLC

                          [email protected]
                          https://www.alphabasesolutions.com


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                            #28
                            Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                            I don't entirely agree. If you try to build once for Mobile and Web you will make both suffer by having to compromise for both. They are radically different targets. You are not going to push a old technology Grid into a mobile device. It can be done with a great amount effort... but will ultimately fail when you try to utilize all the features of that component. It will be one battle after another.
                            To clarify, I'm talking about Mobile as true, installed, applications. I'm not talking about a web page running on an iPad - which is not Mobile.

                            I also disagree that 99.9% of effort has gone into Mobile. 99.9% of effort has gone into the UX... which can, and should, be used for both Mobile and Web.

                            A nice set of templates for Web and Mobile are sorely needed... I sure agree with that. I don't think that they should be bootstrap because those templates are generally horrendously complex and bloated... but a nice set of pre-defined... please pick your overall color-scheme... here's your empty app ready to go with menus etc... should be in place.

                            This has gone way off topic... but an excellent discussion.

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                              #29
                              Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                              speaking of color schemes - the new fan deck and custom color palettes are AWESOME sauce! Makes keeping the tweaks much easier, once I go beyond the "style"
                              NWCOPRO: Nuisance Wildlife Control Software My Application: http://www.nwcopro.com "Without forgetting, we would have no memory at all...now what was I saying?"

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                                #30
                                Re: TabbedUI Component - Good or Bad?

                                You are not going to push a old technology Grid into a mobile device. It can be done with a great amount effort... but will ultimately fail when you try to utilize all the features of that component.
                                I guess I was speaking fast and loose. I don't literally mean the old style grids. Someone told me that Selwyn said if he were designing the grid today, he would build it differently. I think he should go ahead and do that - old style grids stay, but add grids2. Anyway, I was projecting generally. Build a new paradigm based upon responsive CSS. Doesn't mean you try to stuff the old in the new, but provide a brand new option. Doesn't mean it fits every circumstance, but it will fill many.

                                Same thinking regarding bootstrap styles.

                                but a nice set of pre-defined... please pick your overall color-scheme... here's your empty app ready to go with menus etc... should be in place.
                                Yeah, I'm with that totally!
                                Peter
                                AlphaBase Solutions, LLC

                                [email protected]
                                https://www.alphabasesolutions.com


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