The PxPlus/PxBasic Language

Core Features

PxPlus is an exceptionally powerful, versatile, and intuitive programming language for building sophisticated business applications — applications that are ready to accommodate future technologies and a variety of host platforms. PxBasic is a non-commercial version of PxPlus designed for personal and/or educational use.

The base system bundles the PxPlus engine with a suite of highly productive development tools and application-level utilities. It offers a robust native database, convenient access to many external technologies, and true platform-independence--no matter where you develop PxPlus applications, they can be implemented on any other supported platform.

The language itself, which is modeled after Business Basic, allows you to leverage your existing applications, data assets, and developer’s skills while phasing in more advanced functionality.

In essence, PxPlus delivers complete interoperability between character-based and GUI-based applications, a reliable, cost-effective solution for migrating valuable legacy code to newer technologies.

An integrated development environment that offers performance, flexibility, and ease of use.

Some of the PxPlus language features are:

  • Object Oriented Programming support
  • Global variables, functions, and files
  • Associative and dynamic arrays
  • Public and private (local) variables
  • 2 GB string lengths
  • C-style operators
  • O/S command-level access
  • O/S I/O redirection
  • Extensive multilingual support for both developers and applications
  • Version control with Tortoise SVN

Built for Business

Unlike many other languages, PxPlus is designed specifically for business applications and includes features such as:

  • Built-in ISO compatible PDF generator
  • Message libraries for multilingual systems
  • Decimal point and currency formatting control for international markets
  • Customizable rounding control
  • Application copy protection
  • Access to a wide variety of application Icons

PxPlus Development System at a Glance

  • High-Level Programming Language
    Easy to learn, easy to use, easy to maintain and very well supported.
  • Rapid Application Development
    Fully-integrated toolset saves production time and resources.
  • Object-Oriented Programming
    Allows modular programming via OOP-specific language and syntax elements.
  • Platform-Independence
    Microsoft Windows, UNIX, Linux, and Mac OSx implementations available.
  • Robust Data Handling
    Native multi-user database/file system supports multiple file types and generous file sizes.
  • External Data Access
    Built-in access for ODBC, Oracle, DB2, MySQL, and Microsoft SQL server.
  • External Controls
    Support for industry standard technologies, including DDE, DLLs, and OCX/ActiveX/COM controls.
  • PDF Generation
    Create files compatible with Adobe Acrobat and other PDF readers.

Product Licensing

The PxPlus base system may be licensed separately or in combination with a wide variety of add-ons and product options. PxBasic is a limited functionality version of PxPlus for non-commercial use by the hobbyist or educational institutions.

Integrated Development Environment

Whether running from a text mode or graphical environment, PxPlus provides a full featured, robust development environment designed to speed up the development, coding, and testing of application software. Regardless of which environment you choose, text or graphical, PxPlus provides the following key features:

  • Full screen editor
  • Built-in debugger including ability to attach to running processes
  • Global search & replace
  • Selective program trace
  • Conditional breakpoints
  • Customizable syntax tables based on language of your choice
  • Customizable colour syntax and font selection
  • Application security

For Windows Platforms and WindX to UNIX/Linux hosts

When running in a graphical environment such as Windows, PxPlus provides access to a wide variety of standard graphical objects and functionality.

  • Full access to numerous graphical controls (e.g., List Boxes, Multi-Lines, Scroll Bars, Grids, and Menus) for creating standard Windows look and feel
  • Access to built-in system functionality such as the clipboard, Windows multimedia subsystem, and Windows Print subsystem
  • Entry to the Windows Help system using Compiled HTML Help (CHM) files
  • Separate debugging windows for command mode, program trace, breakpoints and watch values
  • A comprehensive set of character and graphical utility toolsets

Programming tools and application-level utilities

The base system bundles the PxPlus engine with the NOMADS toolset, a suite of Rapid Application Development (RAD) tools: Panel Designer, Security Manager, Data Dictionary, Data Classes, File Maintenance, Query Manager, and Message Manager. In addition, PxPlus is equipped with a set of pre-built application level utilities, including Print Preview and Query Display. (more..)

Simple, convenient access to external technologies

To further enhance your applications, PxPlus supports a host of external controls, standards, and protocols:

  • OCX/ActiveX/COM object automation
  • Access to Dynamic Link Libraries (DLLs)
  • DDE access to applications such as MS-Word, MS-Excel, WinFax, etc.
  • Direct TCP/IP access for Server and Client applications
  • A wide range of SQL Server tasks, such as:
    • SQL I/O access methods using any SQL-based environments (Oracle, Informix, etc.) or by using PxPlus SQL statements and queries
    • Migration from native PxPlus file structures to the SQL database file structure of your choice with minimal changes to your program code

A highly effective multi-user native file system

The PxPlus native file system supports numerous file types, including platform independent files, keyed and indexed files, O/S files (flat text or binary), fixed or variable-length records, delimited or binary records, as well as memory files.

File/table sizes can be up to 504 GB with over two billion records per file and individual record sizes up to 2 GB each. Keyed files can have up to 16 key indices per file, with each key composed of up to 255 individual field and/or field segments. Keys (indexes), data dictionary information, and record data for a specific file are stored within each file/table. For compatibility with other Basic systems, keys may be composed of both external and internal (record supplied) data.

Other features include:

  • Integrated data dictionaries on a file-by-file basis
  • Embedded program references in data files that can trigger instructions on file I/O events
  • File journalization
  • Built-in file reconstruction utilities for high speed recovery

Comprehensive support for third party file structures

PxPlus offers you additional power and functionality:

  • SQL based and non-SQL access methods
  • Direct access to Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, MySql, DB2 databases
  • Transaction Commit and Rollback
  • Advisory locking on all supported platforms

Coding advantages for maximum flexibility

With PxPlus, you will enjoy the flexibility of developing your programs in both tokenized and ASCII text formats. You can use tokenized code to improve operating speed in end-user and production environments. And, since PxPlus operates in an interpreted environment, you can create and debug your code on the fly. You can also control and fine-tune caching for maximum local and wide area network performance.

True Object Oriented Programming

PxPlus introduces an approach to Object Oriented Programming (OOP) that enables you to develop applications based on the key design principles (inheritance, encapsulation, and polymorphism) while maintaining access to your existing PxPlus applications and file structures. The language has been extended with a set of new directives and functions to handle OOP mechanisms: define classes, create objects, and reference properties and methods. PxPlus-based OOP objects can also be integrated into external applications using the COM interface with the PxPlus OLE Server Add-on.