6 practical examples on how to use macros
4D 18 R5 introduced form macros. They can be incredibly useful, for example, by providing an ideal way to save time on repetitive tasks. In this blog post, we’ll show you some basic examples to learn more about how macros work and the possibilities they offer. All of the following examples are available on GitHub.
Tableau and 4D: Deploy your WDC to Github Pages
In the How to connect Tableau with 4D blog post, you learned how to create a web data connector (WDC) to request data from 4D and visualize it in Tableau Public.
Now it’s time to host our WDC! Since it only uses HTML and JavaScript files, Github Pages is the best option to store them. This allows others to test your connector directly in their Tableau software. In this blog post, I’ll show you how to proceed.
Bonus: I’ll also show you how to debug your WDC in Tableau Public using Chrome. Let’s get started!
How to connect Tableau with 4D
In 4D Webinar – How to Connect Tableau with 4D, William Taylor (Technical Account Manager, 4D US) gave an overview of the Tableau tool and how it could be used to visualize your 4D data. In this blog post, we’ll dig into the technical details to give you a deeper understanding of how it works. This will allow you to build, for example, a visual showing the highest invoice total with nothing more than 4D REST and Tableau!
Tips: ORDA Data Model Classes
By now you’re aware of the availability of ORDA classes. In this blog post, you’ll learn a few handy tips to get the most out of them!
Project Databases: Build your own documentation for components
In a previous blog post, we showed you that documentation for methods has returned in the Explorer. Want to take things even further and use them as documentation for your components? In this blog post, we’ll show you how!
Remote datastores – A practical use case
One of the most interesting features delivered with 4D v18 was remote datastores. They opened a whole world of possibilities and in this blog post we’ll show you a practical use case:
A better understanding of 4D REST sessions
In a previous blog post, we showed you how to get started with the 4D REST server. We walked you through different CRUD operations using Postman and pointed you to the full REST documentation. In this blog post, We’ll explain how sessions work in 4D. This understanding will ensure that you’ll be able to build a session-based authentication system using the 4D REST server.
Web Scraping using object notation
Want to retrieve data that isn’t available via REST or Web Services? What if it’s only available on a website? The data is easy enough for a human to read, but reading HTML data with a programming language isn’t so simple. Some developers try to use Position and Substring, others try Regex, but it’s unpleasant and time-consuming. A very different approach is to convert the HTML into an object and get the data via object notation. Table rows are handled as collections and are easy to loop through!
This blog post describes how to use this approach and provides some handy tips.
Test the powerful 4D REST server with Postman
4D provides a powerful REST server that enables direct access to data stored in your 4D databases. This makes it possible, for example, to build an API to use with a modern front-end technology (e.g., Angular, React, etc.). In this blog post, we’ll provide the first introduction to the 4D robust REST server. You’ll see how to configure it and test the create, retrieve, update, and delete (CRUD) operations using the API testing tool, Postman.
Project databases: Git. Commit. Pull. Push & more
In a previous blog post, we introduced you to Git (a version control system) and Github (a cloud-based hosting service) and how you can share your 4D code with other developers. In this blog post, we’ll go a bit further by exploring some scenarios a developer may encounter, such as cloning a remote repository, ignoring already committed files, and solving merge conflicts.
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