Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!cbnewsk!ech
From: ech@cbnewsk.att.com (ned.horvath)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: AppMaker and Prototyper
Message-ID: <1990Jul11.033334.1362@cbnewsk.att.com>
Date: 11 Jul 90 03:33:34 GMT
References: <90187.184716KPURCELL@LIVERPOOL.AC.UK>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 37

From article <90187.184716KPURCELL@LIVERPOOL.AC.UK>, by KPURCELL@LIVERPOOL.AC.UK:
> Are people using these in anger? Anybody used both? I have heard that the
> code is smaller and nicer out of AppMaker, but the UI and demo facilities in
> Prototyper are better (why is it always this way :-)

I've used both.  Prototyper is a good prototyping tool - you can get a
"mock up" going pretty quickly.  The code it generates isn't real swell, and
once you start coding you pretty well have to abandon Prototyper: you DON'T
want to change the prototype, regen the code, and have to re-merge all
the changes you've already done.

AppMaker is weaker at faking up connections between menu commands/window
buttons and bringing up other windows.  In my opinion -- and I posted a long
review here a couple months back, say April -- this is overwhelmed by
several very useful characteristics:

- you can generate Think Class Library code.  AppMaker does this very
intelligently, creating classes with reasonable "default" behavior, and
override classes where you can put your stuff.  The former are regenerated
upon demand, the latter are only created the first time, so your code is
preserved.  This makes AppMaker useful as the project proceeds, not just
at the prototyping phase.

- The code is generated from "templates" held as resources in AppMaker.
I've hacked these a fair bit, mostly to change the default classes used
by AppMaker (e.g. CEditText) to something I prefer (e.g. CDialogEdit).

- Several new classes come with AppMaker to extend the class library.

In short, AppMaker 1.1 is the superior product for serious work.  On the
other hand, a close friend has used ProtoTyper a fair bit for putting a
minimal Mac interface on several applications he's ported from Unix, and
has been quite successful despite never cracking Inside Macintosh.

So I recommend both.  I'm using AppMaker...

=Ned Horvath=