Recently i have come across a new or not so new programming language IBM's Enterprise Generation Language EGL. Browsing through some of the articles and tutorials in the net, i came to know that it's a new 4GL which can generate java and cobol code. It's a programming language which let us writing full functions applications. As i said it's a new language it has its own syntax and learning curve. However IBM claims it's easy to learn compare to Java. When i look into the syntax of EGL, it has remind me COBOL which i have studied during my engineering. IBM RAD can be used to develop EGL application. EGL can be used to develop web application which will eventually be converted into java code. EGL contains programs and libraries to create your bussiness and data layer. It has page handlers and jsp's to create presentation layer.
EGL tries to bridge between procedural and Object oriented programmer. It claims that procdural programmers and 4GL developers can develope java web application in EGL with or little knowledge of Java.
However as a java/j2ee/php developer i have certain concerns whether to accept EGL or not.
I would appreciate if someone (EGL experts) to answer below questions. Also request all you readers to continue this discussion which might help someone to choose among EGL,php,java and so on and forth.
Question1: As EGL says a procedural programmer need not to know Object oriented programming. Do they really need not to learn OO ?
Question2: How can we trust EGL, when most of the 4GL are out of market and in the process of migrating to x,y,z technology?
Question3: EGL programmer's need not to know Java/j2ee... However there many best to be proven framework/design pattern in java/j2ee/php. How one will implement these patterns wihout knowing those?
Question4: How about maintainability, scalability, performance, extendibility, reliability and security compare to hand written program in java?
There are many more questions which EGL has to answer before it goes big.
I think we should not have any problem accepting a new language/technology which is better than current trend of technlogy. However it cannot claim global audience if it is just better than some of out of market trend technologies
Regard
Monu
