View source for User:Guyalsfere/Uniface programming language

'''Uniface''' is a 4GL programming language distributed and developed by [[Compuware]].

With Uniface, one can develop applications with a [[Service-oriented_architecture|SOA]] (Service Oriented Architecture (also known as 'Component Based Development')) in a [[Model-driven_architecture|MDA]] (Model Driven Architecture) way. Uniface has been around since the early [[1990s]].

It stores model information and code into a repository, with which one can create forms, reports, services, session services and entity services. Each component written derives its [[metadata]] from the repository (including keys, relations, table layout, field layout, etc.). By drawing [[entities]] within entities on a [[component]], Uniface automatically takes care of [[foreign key transport]] and retrieval of 1 to many relations. This way, a so-called 'fast form' can be written in minutes.

Using templates for components and fields, one can write new programs rapidly by inheriting the code from the model and template. Changes in the model and on the templates are automatically transported to the components that use them.

The database [[abstraction layer]] in Uniface makes many different databases transparent to the developer. Field types in Uniface are automatically mapped to the right ones in the Database.

The represention layer is designed to be platform independent, which means that one can develop on a main platform and execute on many other platforms.

The '''Universal Request Broker''' of Uniface is capable of dealing with many current protocols, including [[CORBA]], [[Tuxedo]], and call-in and -out for many languages and protocols ([[ActiveX]], [[Microsoft .NET|.NET]], [[C_%28programming_language%29|C(++)]], [[Java programming language|Java]], [[COBOL]], [[RPG]], etc.). Reuse of [[legacy code]] is one of the strong points of Uniface.

The URouter/UServer principal of Uniface makes it scalable, balanceable and gives one the ability to run processes asynchronically. UServer is a server with 3 modes:

* [[File_server|File Server]].
* [[Application Server]].
* [[Database_server|Database Server]].

Uniface is highly configurable and can seamlessly adapt to many platforms. Runtime versions are available for  [[Microsoft Windows|Windows]], [[Unix]], [[Linux]], [[VMS]], etc.

==External link==
*[http://www.compuware.com Compuware]