WHAT IS OOFILE? 
OOFILE exists to make life easy for c++ programmers who want to embed a fast
database and particularly those using an application framework, or hooking up to
the World Wide Web.

OOFILE is a c++ framework. It features replaceable database engines with the
current release using Faircom's c-tree Plus ISAM engine. This gives us
royalty-free databases portable across Mac, MS Windows and Unix.


WHO IS OUR MARKET
1) c++ developers (or wannabees) wanting an embedded database for writing
applications, especially those working in combination with an application
framework such as zApp, MFC or PowerPlant.

2) World Wide Web developers seeking a database and report-writer combination to
create web pages in response to queries, searching hundreds of thousands of
records (at least).

3) c-tree users who want to make life a LOT easier 
(a separate feature sheet is available on request,
 which lists the benefits OOFILE adds to c-tree).


Design Goals
- everything is native C++ with no (database) preprocessor required

- keep syntax very simple, familiar to 4GL users and not needing c++ gurus

- safe syntax that makes it hard to do the wrong thing by mistake, making
  maximum use of c++ compiler type-checking, built in debugging modes and 
  third-party tools such as SmartHeap

- implement with a choice of database engines for the backend (imagine using 
  ODBC to pull corporate data into your fast c-tree-based OOFILE EIS system)

- integrate with a range of common application frameworks

- provide additional classes for managing gui interfaces to help construct 
  typical database applications, where features are not commonly part of 
  application frameworks

- use a widely available level of c++ (no RTTI, templates or exception handling)



BASIC PHILOSOPHY
Object-oriented design is mainly about classes, not individual objects.

OOFILE is similar. Most of the time you model your data in terms of classes. You
do NOT declare individual objects (unlike the ODMG model).

Consider a database from the user's view. They generally see collections of data
and edit or interact with individual records from the collection. The user
doesn't care about individual object identity, they don't create symbolic names
for particular objects. These things may be important inside the database, but
do not need to be exposed.


SOME SIMPLE EXAMPLES
Note: for more examples, look on
http://www.highway1.com.au/adsoftware/oofile.html
or
ftp://ftp.highway1.com.au/pub/adsoftware/oofile/


DECLARING SIMPLE TABLES
This example declares a small persistent class with three fields and two
indices for fast searching on the fields.

DECLARE_CLASS(dbPeople)
   dbChar    Name, Address;
   dbLong    Salary;

   dbPeople() : Name(40, "Name", kIndexNoDups), 
              Address(255, "Address"), 
              Salary("Salary", kIndexed)
   {};
};

Note that the constructors also specify the field name strings. These
are optional, but are of great benefit when writing query and
report-writer logic or when constructing a database schema that should
be readable by others.


SOME OTHER FEATURES
- Derived fields, either specified as a combination of existing fields or   
  user-calculated (combined fields in v1.2, user-calc due in 1.3)

- User-defined relations  (due in 1.3)

- keyword indexing (due in 1.3)

- phonetic indexing (due in 1.3)

- inbuilt report-writer


RELATIONSHIPS
One of the big features of an OODBMS is modelling the relationships between
objects. OOFILE allows you to model relationships in a pure OODBMS sense, using
object identifiers, or explicitly perform runtime joins over database fields.
There are a number of syntaxes available to establish relationships. 

The following complete program shows a relationship using direct pointers, but 
OOFILE can also manage relationships with join fields. Joins might be more 
appropriate when adapting an existing database.

DECLARE_REF(dbPatients)
DECLARE_SET(dbVisits)

DECLARE_CLASS(dbPatients)
	dbChar		LastName, Othernames;
	dbVisitsSet	Visits;
	dbLong		Salary;

	dbPatients() :
				LastName(40, "Last Name", kIndexed),
				Othernames(80, "Other names", kIndexed),
				Salary("Salary", kIndexed)
	{
		Visits.propagateRelatedDeletes();
	};
};


DECLARE_CLASS(dbVisits)
	dbPatientsRef	Patient;
	dbDate		VisitDate;
	dbChar		Why;
	dbVisits() : 
				VisitDate("VisitDate", kIndexed),
				Why(200, "Reason for Visit", kIndexCompress)
	{};
};

// declaring the concrete variables
dbConnect_ctree   theDatabase;
dbPatients        Patients;
dbVisits          Visits;
dbRelationship(Patients.Visits, Visits.Patient);

// small sample program to create a parent and child record and print
// the database on the console
int main() {
	theDatabase.newConnection("PROMO.db");
	Patients.newRecord();
	Patients.LastName = "Dent";
	Patients.Visits->newRecord();
	Patients.Visits->VisitDate = "12th May";
	Patients.Visits->Why = "Flu";
	Patients.saveRecord();
	cout << theDatabase;
	return 0;
}

APPLICATION FRAMEWORKS AND OOFILE
GUI Integration classes have been released for PowerPlant (Mac) and are under
development for zApp & MFC with more frameworks to follow. A "non-intrusive"
approach has been taken of providing helper classes and instructions that let
you incorporate OOFILE use into an existing program.

These helper classes include subclasses of the native edit fields, that
store data directly into the database. Depending on your framework,
other classes are added for displaying lists of records, managing
multiple page input forms and similar business application functions.

For Macintosh users, the popular AppMaker code generator has been enhanced to
generate OOFILE applications. You can go from drawing your interface
to a complete working database application, without writing code. 

OOFILE demos are available online and on the CodeWarrior, AppMaker and
Apprentice CD's.

TEST PLATFORMS in-house
c-tree+ v6.4B & 6.5A

Mac 
- CodeWarrior CW8
- Symantec 8.03

MS Windows
- Borland c++ v4.5p3

SunOS 4.1.3
- g++ v2.7


Contact Details

Australian Distributors
Techflow Pty Ltd
5/17 Mooramba Road
Dee Why  NSW 2099
Phone  (02) 9971 4311
Fax  (02) 9982 3623
sales@techflow.com.au


European Distributors
Full Moon Software
PO Box 862, MAIDENHEAD, Berks SL6 0QJ UK
ph: +44 1628 660242 fax: +44 1628 666084 
http://www.u-net.com/~moonweb/
sales@fullmoon.com


US Distributors
Xplain Corporation, through the MacTech Mail Order Store
productinfo@xplain.com
http://www.mactech.com


OOFILE Technical queries, and other international sales
Andy Dent BSc MACS
President and OOFILE Product Architect
A.D. Software
94 Bermuda Drive
Ballajura, Western Australia  6066

Phone/Fax +61-9-249-2719
CompuServe:  100033,3241
Internet:    dent@highway1.com.au
             ftp://ftp.highway1.com.au/pub/adsoftware/
             http://www.highway1.com.au/adsoftware/


OOFILE - ̉the cross-platform OODBMS that speaks c++"