• The design process of an input form New 4GL tool produces its times of this length are somewhat unusual should be interactive and easily modified. for other development tools. • Users should be guided dynamically first success stories through the input form at runtime. According to Michael Ferrante, Principal Pro- is stronger than time • The runtime engine should perform the IAF and RPT were a hit with , and duct Manager responsible for Oracle Forms, transaction to the database dynamical- were a factor in expansion of the customer the following features are likely for the pen- ly. The developer of the form should base. Everyone, from the CIA to the Bank of ding versions (19/20): be able to perform standard Insert, America, major oil and gas companies, down to small IT consulting businesses now develo- Frank Hoffmann, Cologne Data GmbH Update, Locking, Delete and Query • REST call-up functions for external transactions without having to program ped „forms and reports“. services anything. In the event of an error, roll- At that time, customers were still tied com- • Support for SSO with FSAL back should be possible. In addition, all pletely to the database manufacturer and • Identity Cloud Service support SQL commands should be executed in were unable to develop applications • OAuth support the correct sequence. of their own. Data input with UFI (later SQL- • UI improvements (frames, colors, cus- • End users should be able to perform PLUS) or the new C-API was not user-friendly. tom color scheme) even complex queries themselves by • Configurable versions for FSAL using relational operators such as „<“, Now however, customers could both model • Support for Java 11 FSAL (e.g. Java 11+) a database of their own and create it physi- This year, Oracle celebrates an impressive double anniversary: 40 years of ORACLE databases and Forms Bill Friend, „>“, „LIKE“, and in conjunction with • Forms Builder integration with FSAL other variables. cally with UFI, and develop user-friendly in- (currently only http plugin) Oracle‘s fifth member of staff after Bruce Scott (#1004), had been tasked by Larry Ellision in 1979 with developing • The implementation should preserve put forms and reports using IAF/RPT. Further tools developed by Bill were added in the the famous software tool. Before Christmas of the same year, Oracle released the first commercial version of Forms the logic of the relational model, with Together with the changes already published form of EXP/IMP, which enabled databases transactional integrity. in Forms 12, Forms developers will then have together with the first commercial and the first Reports tool two years later. to be exported and migrated. Bill also integ- • User-friendly data input of relationships a range of features at their disposal in Forms rated the „DATE, TIME and TIMESTAMP“ data to other tables should also be possible 19 with which to give their forms a facelift. types into the database, since time data is Mercedes advertised its 1979 G-Class with Motorola 68000 processors. These develop- A simple task given to Bill by by means of „lists of values“. Forms can and should become more profes- often very important during data acquisition. the claim „Stronger than time“—a slogan ments all laid the foundations for future de- • Pre- and post-logic triggers should be sional in their layout, without gray shades, Larry Ellison became ORACLE The result was a cohesive overall package. In that could also be applied to Oracle Forms. velopments by Microsoft, Apple and Oracle, developed for automated SQL trans- with high contrast, and with color palettes 1985 Sohaib Abbasi became resonsible for The ensuing software evolution has already and the spread of the Internet. Forms actions, to enable the SQL logic to be from which the users benefit. lasted 40 years. The module code from ASCII extended with procedural functionality. Oracle Forms. He made Forms the tool we know today. He brought PL/SQL into it long to XML. Support for Java versions from 1 to Oracle‘s first C tools appear Besides familiarizing himself with C, Bill • The best aspects of two worlds were to A further new option will be the outplace- before the DATABASE and made it even more 11, database support for the versions 2.3 to Around this time, a young developer was Friend also got to grips with the new rela- be combined: Dynamically generated ment of Forms development and deployment productive. Many Forms developers are still 19 and Windows support from 3.1 to 2016, looking for a job. His name was Bill Friend, tional database system, working closely with SQL with transaction management, and to the ORACLE Cloud. In a very new develop- working in projects that started in 1999 with together with Linux, Solaris and AIX support. and he did what other job-seekers usually Bruce Scott. Within a couple of months he facility for use of procedural extensions ment described in a white paper in Novem- a version of his that is still in production. The tool has kept pace with these changes did in those days: he grabbed the Yellow Pa- was familiar not only with C, but also with with runtime triggers for application lo- ber 2018, Mike Ferrante presents the new op- Forms for the Internet was designed in his every stage along the way, but without users ges, flicked through to „Data Processing“, and the database technology and the DB APIs. gic. (SYSTEM-R triggers were an ORACLE portunities for Forms development (DEVOPS) time too. The idea to have a stateless client as having to re-write their existing code—a huge looked for suitable companies. Under „S“, his He then had to figure out for himself exactly vision and were not yet implemented in the cloud. (See annex for link.) The author and a stateful server process with benefit. Standard 4GL functions such as row eye fell on „Software Development Labs“. A what his tasks were going to be. In this peri- in the database; they appeared first in will present a paper on the subject of Oracle a solid SQLNET connection is still a powerful locking, binding, and use of PL/SQL in the company with three founding members and od, no one at Oracle was supervised, much Forms). Cloud at the next Forms Day. current database also represent huge advan- a talented developer named Bruce Scott less told exactly what to do. Everyone in the • The tool should be portable to all ope- engine today and probably the only pure PL/ SQL tool which does not need extensions. It tages over any other PL/SQL tool. in their employ. Bill Friend‘s first phone call company did what they did best, and with a rating systems. Let‘s start giving some thought to the 50th is nearly impossibe to replace Forms. It was was answered by . When asked by passion. Bill however had no specific project • A „CRT“ form should make the system Forms anniversary in 2029. It‘s a fitting time to look back to the- begin Bill about a job, Bob replied: „We‘re creating of his own, and so he went to Larry and asked compatible with a range of monitors tried many times without real success. For nings of Oracle Forms, in order to understand the first commercial relational database ma- for one. Larry responded by saying that the the last 15 years there were many attempts (e.g. 24x80 character grid on a cathode Additional Information the reasons why it was created. Tips from nagement system, we‘re doing it on DEC PDP company needed a more user-friendly way of ray tube monitor). to do it. In the interviews some good answers Michael Ferrante and social media led me to minicomputers in assembly language, but we writing data to the database than by means • Input was also to be possible on tele- are given to find answers to this question. Interesting version table with release dates Bill Friend, the developer of the original versi- want to rewrite it in C for portability. We need of an „INSERT“ command. Bill, he suggested, types, since not every workstation was of the Oracle databases on, and I had the privilege of interviewing him someone who can write some tools for the could perhaps program a „prompt“ to be di- equipped with a monitor at this time. Bill and Sohaib left as VP and SVP Tool divi- in detail on the subject. At 60, he is still very li- thing“. splayed for each database column. And that sion and were probably one main reason for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oracle_Data- base vely and can recall numerous details from the was how it started. Starting from these very Using the full range of possibilities offered by the success of ORACLE in the first 20 years. early days of Forms. With a 9-hour difference Bill drove to Sand Hill Circle in Menlo Park for vague instructions, Bill produced a detailed C, Bill Friend developed the first version of White paper on DEVOPS for Oracle Forms in between our time zones, we agreed to talk in his interview, and was invited to lunch with concept that went much further than simply Oracle Forms within a little over 4 weeks. Larry Forms now, in 2019 the ORACLE Cloud (November 2018) the late afternoon (CET). Bob Miner and Larry Ellison. Once Bob had satisfying Larry‘s request. Ellision named the product IAF (Interactive Ap- https://www.oracle.com/technetwork/deve- demonstrated a couple of database queries plication Facility). The name was subsequent- Many Forms customers have switched to the loper-tools/forms/documentation/oracle- The story that follows and the interview are using UFI (User Friendly Interface—a fore- Bill‘s basic concept for Oracle Forms 1979 ly changed, first to „Fastforms“, then to „SQL condensed from information provided by runner of SQL Plus) and Bill had described Bill‘s intention was to make life easier for current platform (12.2.1.3), are launching „na- forms-in-dcs-5216022.pdf Forms“, until it finally became „Oracle Forms tive“ modernizations, and are looking ahead Bill Friend and an interview conducted at the his programming experience to Bob and the forms developer and forms user, and and Reports“ (from Version 3 onwards). end of December 2018. It was Bill‘s first ever Larry, the two sides quickly came to an ag- to achieve a high level of productivity in the to the new versions, Forms 19 and Forms 20, The birth of Oracle Reports which have already been announced. Version interview on the subject of Oracle Forms in reement. The fact that Bill didn‘t have a uni- development of forms, in line with the 4GL Larry had promised a customer a reporting 40 years. versity degree wasn‘t seen as a problem, nor theory: 19 will primarily be a maintenance release. tool, and Bill was asked whether he could Further changes are to be introduced with that he had never developed anything in C at perhaps quickly produce one. His holiday that point—that could, after all, be learned. Source: Wikipedia Version 20. As is now standard with ORACLE Forms sees the light of day could be upgraded (to Paris or Hawaii) if he databases, the version number is now based For Larry and Bob, Bill was exactly the right „A 4th-generation programming language were willing to postpone it in order to com- (4GL) or (procedural language) is any compu- upon the year of the product‘s release. Forms first sees the light of day in 1979. person: „smart“ enough for the job. Their in- plete the task. Bill took an older documenta- ter programming language that belongs to a Several interesting and exciting developments stinct was to prove correct. Bill Friend thus tion solution (FMT) produced by Bruce Scott class of languages envisioned as aadvance- At present, it seems very likely that Version appeared in 1979. Quincy Jones gave Michael became the number 5 at Oracle, the second and added functions to it similar to those in ment upon third-generation programming 19 will once again be shipped together with Jackson his big break with „Off the Wall“. Mer- employee recruited by the company, and the Forms. The facility to declare additional vari- beginning of the company‘s expansion from 5 languages (3GL).“ Reports. This will provide all customers with a cedes developed the first of its G-Class series. ables, select statements with variables, loops, little more time to evaluate alternatives. In Japan, Namco launched „Galaxian“, its first employees to 500 in the years that followed. and IF statements were also added. Around 4GL programming languages are designed to color arcade-based game. Galaxian was follo- two weeks later, RPT appeared and was de- enable functions or complete applications to Mission times of 20 to 30 years are by no me- wed by the famous „Galaga“ and „Pac-Man“ Bill immediately bought „The C Programming livered together with the database. Bill was be written quickly, with the fewest possible ans uncommon for Oracle Forms projects. games, long before home computers emer- Language“, a book by Brian Kernighan and then able to enjoy a holiday on Hawaii with Dennis Ritchie (K&R book), which had appea- lines of code, for a certain area of application. Like Oracle itself with its Enterprise Business ged as a dominant force. It was also a year his girlfriend. Suite (EBS), parts of which are still based Frank Hoffmann of major technical developments however, red in 1978. He had great fun teaching him- These were the targets that Bill Friend had upon Oracle Forms, customers are currently [email protected] such as TCP/IP, the C programming language, self C, and had found the very job he‘d always wanted. set himself: planning support and further development and the sales launches of the Intel 8088 and of their applications up until 2030. Mission

44 www.aoug.at • www.doag.org • www.soug.ch Red Stack Magazine 01/2019 45 Interview with Bill Friend Interview with Sohaib Abbasi December 31, 2018 January 21, 2019 responsible for Forms from 1979 until 1985 responsible for Forms from 1985 until 2003

>FH What are your favorite all-time features very smart, very direct, very cutting when it technology or updated it suffi ciently. Per- FH> Can you tell us how you came to Ora- productivity: building transaction proces- change their code. of ORACLE Forms? came to critical issues relating to the soft- haps this is a missed opportunity. People cle and why you took over the tools of Bill sing applications faster than using 3GLs FH> If my records are correct PL/SQL was ad- I would say automation of the transac- ware. Everyone was absolutely committed want to push new products that they think Friend? or other tools. Another key benefi t was ded to Forms in 1988 with Version 3 – was tion—the dynamic SQL and correct se- to their own area and in continual compe- could replace something as old as Forms. database integration: Forms automati- this diffi cult? quencing of triggers based on end-user tition with others to get the best possible As I said in my bio, Oracle is a very compe- In 1982, I joined RSI (Relational Software cally took advantage of the latest Oracle manipulation of the form data. User gui- result. Not just on work things—no, tennis, titive place. But until and unless the new Inc.) to start the sales operations in 13 database innovations. Perhaps, Forms’ Forms was the fi rst tool to include PL/ dance controlled by transactions and trig- fi ngertip pull-ups in the doorways, poker, products capture the essence of what ma- mid-western states of the U.S. In 1982, most important unique benefi t was por- SQL. The database included PL/SQL after gers. you name it. And no one was more com- kes Forms powerful—high performance, RSI did not have any customers, or even tability and adaptability –portable appli- Forms. Adding PL/SQL was diffi cult becau- Productivity though (which encompasses petitive than Larry. He wanted to be the high productivity—both for non-pro- in an offi ce, in the midwest. After two cations that ran across multiple operating se Forms had to help debug PL/SQL V1. many features) is the heart of it. That was best, and for us to achieve the best results grammers and programmers, then Forms years of meeting hundreds of customers systems and GUIs – adaptable applications Adding PL/SQL to Forms was also diffi cult something our competition never seemed in our work. This had an infl uence on the will likely continue, and thrive. to market and sell Oracle, I transferred to that even ran on multiple generations of as Forms supported declarative applica- to match. The approach was basically 4GL, products that we developed. I sometimes regret now never getting to product development in 1984. I chose to computing – mainframes, client-server tion development and PL/SQL supported and where the 4GL was no longer suffi - work on a replacement myself because I work on Tools because the # 1 customer and Internet. Portability and adaptability procedural development – two diff erent cient, you could augment the logic with FH> What is the impact of a shift from Forms, have some ideas from my experience in requirement was to help improve develo- without requiring customers to change approaches. In addition, both Forms and procedural tools. a 4GL language, to a 3GL language? applications and data warehousing that per productivity. Tools improved develo- their code. PL/SQL separately integrated with the Ora- BF> About the time I was leaving, there would have built on the core features of per productivity. cle database and it was diffi cult to share FH> Oracle Forms turns 40 this year, and its was a real movement towards programm- Forms and dealt with a lot of the limitati- FH> How important was Forms for Oracle? this context. The benefi t was that PL/SQL popularity is growing. Did you originally fo- ing forms in Java, moving away from 4GL. ons that it runs up against. FH> How popular was Forms when you got became an extension to write any busi- resee this success? I‘m not sure that was a good thing. You into responsibility and what did you think ab- Till 1994, on mainframe and minicompu- ness logic in Forms, making Forms even BF> I‘m honored that Oracle Forms, in an- lose a lot if your procedural (3GL) tool do- FH> Our next Forms Day is on February 21. out its 4GL technology at this time? ters, almost every Oracle customer used more capable. other incarnation but true to its roots, is esn‘t retain the power of the „4GL“ aspects: Would you be willing to attend from America Forms. After 1996, on client-server sys- still in use and may be for some time to specifi cally, managing the transaction and by SKYPE and get to know the German DOAG Almost all Oracle customers used IAF that tems, Forms became the preferred tool FH> How big was your development team come. I never expected it to survive this all the associated SQL invisibly to the deve- Forms fan club? was renamed SQL*Forms and later re- for Oracle, competing against third party 1985,1990,1995,2000..? long and frankly was hoping something loper. All this has to be done by the develo- BF> Yes! named Oracle Forms. It was the prima- tools on Microsoft Windows. And, in 2001, better would have come along by now (I pers themselves in 3GL languages. ry “front-end” for building data entry, or Forms enabled applications to be access Tools development, after Bill Friend left, had also wanted to rearchitect it to get rid transaction processing, applications for on the Internet, simply by using a Java-po- was one person in 1985: it was me. By of some of the limitations). There are not Non-procedural 4GL languages are incre- Oracle. As an early 4GL, Forms pioneered wered . Tools product line, the time I retired in 2003, Oracle Tools had many examples of systems or products dibly good at expressing certain compli- several concepts including declarative ap- including Forms, was important for Oracle more than a thousand developers. with that kind of lifespan in an industry cated things in a simple way, which is why plication development, metadata-based but the reason for its importance chan- that has changed so much. I think I started developers love 4GL tools. But these tools specifi cation, automated metadata-driven ged. Till 1994, Tools were important as FH> What do you think how many customers to feel like I had built something important lack that ability to be tuned precisely to code generation and visual development a signifi cant revenue generating product have developed with Forms in its peak times? and lasting in 1984, when I saw jobs being some aspect that the 4GL was not desig- environment. line. After 1994, another reason for the advertised for Forms and Reports develo- ned to do or is outside its scope. And that‘s importance of Oracle Tools was that Ora- Majority of the Oracle database customers pers. where people start hating them. FH> How important was backwards compati- cle e-Business application suite were built and every Oracle eBusiness Application bility all these years for Oracle Forms? and delivering using these. customer were using Oracle Tools, inclu- FH> Someone said once that Forms/Reports Procedural languages give you the ultima- ding Forms. Ten of thousands of enterpri- and the database were the only pieces of te fl exibility—which developers love—but Forms supported compatibility with mul- FH> How important was Oracle Forms for ses used Forms. software that Oracle had ever made itself; then all the „free“ stuff you got with the tiple versions of the Oracle database, the growing business of Oracle? the rest was sourced externally. Is that true? 4GL disappears. operating systems, and GUIs as well as FH> Did you think Oracle Forms would reach BF> At the time we were starting Oracle, backward compatibility with older Forms. Oracle Tools, including Forms, was one of the age of 40 years today with the perspective Computer Associates was how Oracle is Forms, which has had automated trans- In fact, early Oracle customers who built Oracle’s top advantages over the traditio- of another 10 years support? today—buying mostly everything to grow. action management and the facility to in- applications on mainframes with charac- nal database vendors. IBM, Ingres, Infor- Today, Oracle looks much more like CA in tegrate procedural triggers since its early ter-mode interfaces migrated these ap- mix and Sybase did not off er similar tools. We certainly did not plan for that long. We some respects. Oracle Designer, Oracle Ap- days, gives you that ability to mix the two plications to client-server systems with In the late 1980’s, Tools generated more always focused on the next version and, plications (the original ones), many of the paradigms. graphical user interfaces (GUI) and later to than 35% of Oracle’s product revenue. more importantly, the next computing data warehouse tools including the one I the Internet with web browser interfaces platform like the Internet. built in 1998-2000 were done in house. FH> Do you remember how big your de- – all without changes to their code. In ot- FH> What were the major enhancements you velopment unit was for the initial versions of her words, using the Forms, the customers added to Oracle Forms in your responsibility FH> Why do you think is it so diffi cult to FH> How infl uential was Larry Ellison in the Forms? automatically adapted to new computing time for Forms? replace Forms? development process of Forms over the ye- BF> One developer. And at the very end systems. ars? there was also Sohaib Abbasi, who took Developer productivity: Metadata-driven Forms off ered a unique declarative de- BF> Larry is the smartest guy I ever met over after I left. He went on to become FH> How many years have you been respon- specifi cation stored in the database. Visu- velopment approach well integrated with and also a true visionary—not just in tech- the SVP of the Tools Division. In hindsight sible for Oracle Forms? al development using a “screen painter“. the Oracle database. As the Forms appli- nology, but really visionary at how to grow I should have thought about hiring people cations continue to function, there was a company. He also has a very self-depre- to help me, but that thought never even From 1985 to 2003. I started as a pro- Scalability and performance: Client-side less reasons for customers to consider cating sense of humor that I found ende- crossed my mind as I just enjoyed doing grammer on Forms in 1984 and managed PL/SQL that supported application parti- alternatives. aring and made him super-approachable. everything myself. the team when I retired from Oracle in tioning – moving business logic, coded in I really like the guy, but it could be frust- 2003. PL/SQL, between client and server to im- rating at times working for him. Likewise, FH> In your opinion, why do we now see so prove performance. Bob Miner had a huge infl uence on me little promotion of Forms by Oracle? FH> What do you think are the key benefi ts and was a great guy. The one thing ever- BF> They are busy promoting cloud tech- of Forms, why did Forms become a strategic Portability and Adaptability: allowed yone in the early days at ORACLE had in nology and they have not provided a mi- tool for Oracle and other tools did not? mainframe applications to seamlessly mig- common was that they were strong-willed, gration path from Forms to other cloud rate to client-server platforms and later to The main benefi t of Forms was developer Internet – all without forcing customers to