Started an interest in progaming in the mid-70s in BASIC (just BASIC no GW- / -A / Q- etc) on some weird mail order units pre-spinning disk storage. Eventually a hobby became a job [
bonus]....{
go sub (whatwereyouusingbeforeB4X)}
What are you using B4X for?
So, after all that, now retired and looking to
supplement income;
keep the brain active and interested in problem creation and solving;
making collection management phone based;
creating phone based exposure for a national sector training and education authority;
long awaited arduino/ESP32 projects started from scratch (B4R) (never had the time nor background)
just plain extending the fun.
How did you discover B4X?
If I remember correctly a friend mentioned it when we were talking about Android programming options. A bit of Google later "alternatives to Android Studio" or just Android programming tools). AND, finding this forum and noting how different its attitude and the open-minded approach of its members played a big role at the final stages. Not forgetting, that at this point Google found
@Peter Simpson 's challenge to his mates in AS. That was it, no-brainer. Had already downloaded the B4A Trial at that point - but pretty much by the end of Peter's mail bought the License....
Contrary to popular believe in another thread : ITs not that hard to find B4X in a search. There again Google is only as good as the question you ask....
What were you using before B4X?
......
and then it was through FORTRAN, C, Pascal, tiny bit of assembler, and a host of forgotten flavours of the repetitive constructs of IF..THEN..ELSE FOR .. NEXT Do While WHILE DO etc etc etc. Latest work was in PHP developing in-house one off scripts for research department; main one being an image and GIS database back and front end for users to access data and image files for download.
Tried Android Studio and Jet/jelly/beans but gave up......too much JAVA for my age.....well for any age really.....
Which means THANKS to the guys here who DO have JAVA and contribute all those libraries and so on.
What have you learnt while developing with B4X?
Its re-enforced one of my developer principles devised after years of doing it : The FRONT END is really important in keeping your user happy, engaged with your software and still speaking to you. So many APPs / programs are written from a directly programmer viewpoint = meaning getting those 50 lines that are the work-horse code running (and/or efficiently) so that there is no regard for the lengthy / non-existent path users are stuck with at the end. Anyone get irritated by five clicks to get to either a dead end or a sub-menu ....?
As an aside. Think what you like about Steve Jobs, but, he wasn't a programmer, and if you read about his chief industrial designer {Jonny Ive) and how they interacted, Jobs's big thrust was always make it easy to use, make it cutting-edge, you've got 10-days to production. (Jonny Ive may have been from close to
@Peter Simpson 's neck of the woods.)
Might FINALLY be getting the hang of CLASSES and OBJECTS that those academics in Com Sci departments have rammed down our throats.....
What are your future plans with B4X?
- Keep my days,or part of the days, (er nights ?) occupied with challenges;
- bring ideas stored for some years to fruition now that I have a REALLY usable tool / IDE;
- After years in the academic world (as a technician), enjoying the exchange of technical knowledge without having to deal with 'stole-my-research' paranoia;
- carry on learning in the Nelson Mandela mould (life-long learning).
O and see same question in #3......
Actually, even if I stop doing B4X coding I'll still follow these fora, Chit Chat in particular (what B4xers do in downtime, and proof that downtime is never idyll).
Tha'l do Pig .....??
