twinBASIC Update: July 15, 2024

On April 23, 2021, I helped Wayne Phillips introduce the world to twinBASIC at the Access DevCon Vienna conference.  I boldly predicted that twinBASIC (along with the Monaco editor) would replace VBA and its outdated development environment by 2025.  With that goal in mind, this weekly update is my attempt to keep the project fresh in the minds of the VBA development community.

Every Sunday Monday week, I will be providing updates on the status of the project, linking to new articles discussing twinBASIC, and generally trying to increase engagement with the project.  If you come across items that should be included here, please leave a comment below.

Here are some links to get involved with the project:

• Custom twinBASIC IDE Installation Guide
• twinBASIC Discord Server (chat about the project)
• twinBASIC Wiki (list of new features not in VBx)
• GitHub Issue Tracker (report bugs)
• twinBASIC/VBx LinkedIn Group

Highlights

Report Writer Making Progress

Wayne released a new sneak peek video of the soon-to-be-released twinBASIC report writer.

The video highlights a few features you can expect to see when the tool is released:

• Five sections:
  • Report Header
  • Page Header
  • Report Detail
  • Page Footer
  • Report Footer
• BeforePrint event on the report itself (no section events yet)
• Print Preview with adjustable zoom
• Save to PDF (via virtual printer driver "Microsoft Print to PDF" )

According to Wayne:

It's almost ready for release.   Should be ready Monday.

Discord Chat Summary

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twinBASIC Development Update: July 9-15, 2024

This week's discussions in the twinBASIC Discord server focused on upcoming features, bug fixes, and comparisons with other development environments. The community engaged in conversations about report generation capabilities, cross-platform support, and potential improvements to the IDE.

Key points from the conversations:

• The twinBASIC team is close to releasing a new report designer feature. A sneak peek video was shared, showcasing the drag-and-drop interface and various design options. The release is expected early next week.

• Cross-platform support remains on the roadmap for twinBASIC. The team is exploring "Custom Controls" that are OS-independent and drawn directly like bitmaps, avoiding reliance on traditional Windows HWNDs.

• Discussions about exporting reports to various formats (PDF, Excel, CSV) highlighted the complexity of interpreting graphical designs for text output. While PDF export is possible through printing, direct Excel and CSV exports are not immediately planned.

• The report designer will include features such as zoom options, different section types (e.g., Report Header vs. Page Header), and a print button in the preview display.

• An object model for manipulating twinBASIC reports at runtime is under consideration. Currently, there's a BeforePaintSection event, with potential for more granular control in future updates.

• Users reported issues with CodeGen errors, highlighting the importance of proper syntax and the need for clear reproduction steps when reporting bugs.

• The community discussed the use of WinMM timers with callbacks in VB6, sharing resources and experiences to help developers transitioning to twinBASIC.

In conclusion, this week saw significant progress on the report designer feature, with its imminent release generating excitement in the community. The ongoing focus on cross-platform development and runtime report manipulation demonstrates twinBASIC's commitment to evolving into a versatile and powerful development environment. The active discussions around VB6 compatibility and advanced features like timers underscore the project's goal of providing a smooth transition path for legacy code while offering modern capabilities.

Around the Web

Nothing new this week.

Changelog

Here are the updates from the past week.  You can also find this information by visiting the GitHub twinBASIC Releases page.

Releases · WaynePhillipsEA/twinbasic

Contribute to WaynePhillipsEA/twinbasic development by creating an account on GitHub.

GitHubWaynePhillipsEA

No new releases since my last update.  

Busy working on the forthcoming report writer, methinks.