Sybase Releases Beta of PowerBuilder 12

Sybase released on Aug. 18 a beta version of its PowerBuilder 12 tool, an update of the company's tool for Microsoft .NET development. According to a company statement:

Sybase will ship PowerBuilder with two self-contained modules, one designed for Windows 32-based development and a new comprehensive module for developing Windows Presentation Foundation-based applications on top of the Microsoft Visual Studio shell.

"PowerBuilder 12 is one of the most significant releases in the product's history," David Tong, vice president of engineering at Sybase, said in the statement. "We have recognized the need in the PowerBuilder community for a versatile and open .NET development tool and have responded with a solution that empowers developers to quickly and easily deliver .NET Framework-based applications without limitations via end-to-end managed code."

PowerBuilder 12 works with Microsoft's Visual Studio tool set to enhance productivity for developers using the .NET Framework and facilitates the development of WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) applications. Also, Sybase said PowerBuilder 12 enables developers to "maximize their existing investment in code and skills with a solution that converts Win32 code to the .NET Framework."

In addition, "Sybase's patented DataWindow has been completely rewritten to natively support Windows Presentation Foundation and allow for deployment of fully managed code in .NET Framework-based applications," the company said.

"By leveraging the Visual Studio Shell, Sybase is providing its community of developers with even more flexibility in building and deploying data-driven applications that target the Windows platform," said Matt Carter, group product manager for Visual Studio at Microsoft. "Microsoft is pleased to be working with Sybase to enable custom tools such as PowerBuilder." According to the statement:

PowerBuilder 12 provides key new features and benefits, including:

[...]

   •   The ability to leverage the extensive library of plug-ins the Visual Studio ecosystem provides and third-party components from commercial, open source and freeware vendors

   •   Open and heterogeneous database support for access to virtually any database management system (DBMS)

[...]

   •   Visual Inheritance for Windows Presentation Foundation windows and User Objects

   •   Drag-and-drop capability from the Solution Explorer, providing immediate access to properties and methods of controls graphically added to Windows Presentation Foundation windows

The Sybase PowerBuilder 12 beta program is open as of Aug. 18 and developers can learn more about the beta program at the Sybase TechWave Symposium on Aug. 26 to 27 in Washington. For more information about signing up for the PowerBuilder 12 beta program, go here.