A screen generator, also known as a screen painter, screen mapper, or forms generator is a software package (or component thereof) which enables data entry screens to be generated declaratively, by "painting" them on the screen WYSIWYG-style, or through filling-in forms, rather than requiring writing of code to display them manually.
commonly incorporate a screen generator feature. They are also commonly found bundled with database systems, especially entry-level databases.
A screen generator is one aspect of an application generator, which can also include other functions such as
report generation and a
data dictionary
A data dictionary, or metadata repository, as defined in the ''IBM Dictionary of Computing'', is a "centralized repository of information about data such as meaning, relationships to other data, origin, usage, and format". ''Oracle Corporation, ...
. The earliest screen generators were character-based; by the 1990s, GUI support became common, and then support for generating
HTML forms as well. Some screen generators work by generating code to display the screen in a high-level language (for example, COBOL); others store the screen definition in a data file or in database tables, and then have a runtime component responsible for actually displaying the form and receiving and validating user input.
Examples
Examples of screen generators include:
* IBM Screen Definition Facility II: generates screens for
CICS BMS,
IMS MFS,
ISPF
In computing, Interactive System Productivity Facility (ISPF) is a software product for many historic IBM mainframe operating systems and currently the z/OS and z/VM operating systems that run on IBM mainframes. It includes a Text editor, screen e ...
,
GDDM and
CSP/AD.
* Performix for
Informix
Informix is a product family within IBM's Information Management division that is centered on several relational database management system (RDBMS) and multi-model database offerings. The Informix products were originally developed by Inform ...
.
*
Microsoft Visual Basic
* the forms component of
Microsoft Access
Microsoft Access is a database management system (DBMS) from Microsoft that combines the relational database, relational Access Database Engine (ACE) with a graphical user interface and software-development tools. It is a member of the Microsof ...
*
Oracle Developer,
in particular its
Oracle Forms
Oracle Forms is a software product for creating screens that interact with an Oracle database. It has an IDE that includes an object navigator, property sheet, and code editor that uses PL/SQL. It was originally developed to run server-side i ...
component
* the QDesign component of
PowerHouse
*
SystemBuilder/SB+
* the ''Screen Painter'' component of SAP's
ABAP Workbench
* the FoxView component of
FoxPro. FoxView was originally developed by Luis Castro as a
dBASE
dBase (also stylized dBASE) was one of the first database management systems for microcomputers and the most successful in its day. The dBase system included the core database engine, a query system, a Form (programming), forms engine, and a pr ...
screen generator named ''ViewGen''; Fox purchased it and bundled it with FoxPro 1.0.
Later, Fox replaced Castro's code with their own screen painter code.
*
dBASE
dBase (also stylized dBASE) was one of the first database management systems for microcomputers and the most successful in its day. The dBase system included the core database engine, a query system, a Form (programming), forms engine, and a pr ...
included a built-in screen generator in dBASE IV onwards; in dBASE III and earlier, third party screen generators were available, including the already mentioned ''ViewGen''
* DPS 1100 for
UNIVAC 1100 series mainframes.
References
{{reflist
Programming tools