VFP2IIS Documentation Support Company

Documentation

Introduction

This is a prerelease documentation, information here is subject to change.

License

License

VFP2IIS program, documentation and demo files included are provided "as is", without any warranty whatsoever. You use the software at your own risk. PRO-EKO Ostrava spol. s r.o. disclaims all warranties and conditions, either express or implied, including, without limitation, warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose. In no event will PRO-EKO Ostrava spol. s r.o. be liable for any damages, including, without limitation, direct, indirect, special, incidental or consequential damages of any kind, even if PRO-EKO has been advised of the possibility of such damages. You agree not to obtain or use the software in any state or country that does not allow the exclusion or limitation of liability for incidental or consequential damages.

 

Warning - The use of VFP2IIS in conjunction with a VFP application alters the rights restrictions of the WEB application and its use without protection in user application can become an object for attack of hackers.

Restriction of FREE version

This is a fully functional version of VFP2IIS for the development and testing of your own WEB applications. With this version You can develop your own application on a local PC. This version cannot be used on server (except for testing in server environment) and for commercial distribution. This version has only one restriction - in case it is not run locally (localhost - IP 127.0.0.1) on each request will be displayed window About.

Terminology

When not mentioned, the terms used in the manual are directly borrowed from from VFP terminology (e.g. standard VFP controls names are used for objects, samples of code are in VFP code etc. ) In WEB - IE and VFP are objects, which have not direct equivalent each other e.g. VFP pageframe, spinner or IE frameset. Many VFP object are simulated in IE as couple of IE elements. In these cases VFP names of controls are used.

Eventhough VFP2IIS does many operations automatically, for complex WEB application you may need to customize and modify your VFP code to handle differences with IE.

 

Two important terms, used in the manual, are defined as follows:

 

 

 

Main Object
Is an object created and registered in VFP2IIS as a standalone, in a similar manner as the VFP function createobject. In this version it is always VFP "Form". The function CreateForm creates the main object and registers it in VFP2IIS. All controls supported by VFP2IIS must be the Main Object or belong to it. (Objects created in VFP like x = newobject(....) or directly with VFP command do form ... are not Main Object, because they are not registered in VFP2IIS – therefore they are unknown for VFP2IIS).

Main Object is important for VFP2IIS to access controls and some methods are valid and may be invoked only on Main Object - marked with scope = MAIN

 

 

Root Object
Is an object for which a request was made to be  displayed separately in its own IE Window (frame, iframe, window). A RootObject is always part of the Main Object; if Root Object is identical to the Main Object, all properties and methods of the Root Object are valid on the Main Object. The Root Object is a VFP object for which a standalone HTML document is generated and is opened in IE in a window (frame).

For each RootObject, one HTML document with its header and form tag is generated;  communication and synchronization are standalone through their own request.

Root Object is important when working with frames. All VFP visual control can be Root Object, with the exception of column, header and cell of grid; usually a VFP container is root object.

 

The relation between Main Object and Root Object is "similar" to the relation between VFP Formset and Form.

Features

VFP2IIS is a tool used for running a VFP program on a WEB server. VFP2IIS with IIS provide automatic conversion VFP user interface into IE thru HTML code. Most forms can be run as desktop or WEB application without any additional code.

VFP2IIS allows the insertion of personal scripting and IE event bindings to HTML code.

VFP can therefore be used as tool for developing WEB application, especially application working with data.

 

VFP2IIS enables the developper to control processes through the properties and methods of VFP controls. With this possibility you can redefine default event and data handling, generate your own html code with scripting and in extreme cases completely change VFP2IIS behaviour.

 

Basic features

- Only VFP code, no additional components are needed

- Common VFP controls for desktop and WEB user interface, (same form can be used for desktop and WEB UI)

- Automatic data synchronization between Desktop and IE

- Automatic event binding from IE to VFP control (click, rightclick, dblclick, resize)

- Powerful HTML generator of all visual VFP controls, with respect to most properties (positioning, coloring, font styles, mouse pointers, text style and alignment) excluding the graphical style of checkbox and option button 

- Generator supports anchoring, generate HTML with dependency on anchoring value

- Simple control of HTML generation thru additional properties of VFP controls

- Possibility of IE Window (frame) synchronization (refreshing)

 

Additional features

- Use of a function similar to the VFP Messagebox with handling return value from IE in VFP

- Binary output for sending generated binary files or streams like PDF output

- Support easy definition of context menu through list of bars (similar to a popup shortcut menu ) with automatic back bindings to VFP control

- Utilities (HTML encoding, decoding, path conversion, load template and substitution)

- Displaying parts of form in separate IE Window

- Easy upload files to server

- Interface for AddIn VFP modules

 

Special features

(Features not supported by VFP UI - used in WEB application through properties)

- HTML iframe, frame support

- HTML Microsoft filter support

- Open interface of HTML generator supports the insertion of own java and vb script, data conversion or redefinition of generated HTMLcode

 

Limitation

VFP2IIS only supports VFP native objects. Since some frequently used parts of your VFP application may be not directly supported, you must check your VFP code and generate HTML, especially for:

- VFP control class (can be used as container, but is not handled automatically by VFP2IIS)

- VFP Menu

- ActiveX and embedded objects like tree, date picker

 

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