Many Cards Versus One Card and a List Field

[Jerry Daniels]

On Jan 14, 2008, at 12:49 PM, Russell Martin wrote:

> if I can't realistically store large amounts of data
> in stacks (and get acceptable speed), then what is the point of  
> using a
> stack based development tool?

Russell,

This is an excellent question. The relevancy of cards (or even stack- 
based data-rich lists) being used for data is the issue, I think. The  
idea of local-only data is becoming anachronistic in a world where  
data is more likely to be stored in "the cloud" where it can stored  
and shared. I store my data in a cloud (on a server "somewhere"  
identified by a URL). I just tag field and button data with Rev field  
names and save/load them to and from text files. I also index records  
in separate file for fast searches and lists in my UI.

The idea of factoring data from UI is not a bad idea or a new one.  
That said, I DO use cards, but they house the different UI's dictated  
by the workflow of my apps. Rev stack/card metaphor serves very nice  
for this. The case for "factoring" comes from the idea that sending  
your app to someone else with all its data uses a lot of bandwidth  
whereas sending an app that accesses the separate data makes for easy  
app sharing. Sharing an app is sharing human intelligence--a good thing.

If your data is forever to be local and never shared, it might make  
more sense to use the cards for record data. Myself, I think of my  
apps as being used by someone other than myself--even if it's just  
someone with whom I work. Since everyone with whom I work is tethered  
to the cloud, i put my data into the cloud.

My 2 centavos,

Jerry Daniels

Daniels & Mara, Inc.
Makers of GLX2
http://www.daniels-mara.com/glx2