Is revolution right for my project?

[Geoff Canyon]

At 1:14 PM -0500 4/12/02, delay wrote:
>I am looking to develop a fairly advanced email application with builtin
>spam filtering, etc.  I am new to desktop application programming and
>looking at learning runtime revolution or realbasic most likely.  I
>currently know perl and php, so I am not completely new to programming.
>
>My question is... are there any components that deal with the smtp, pop3,
>and imap protocols that can be used with runtime revolution. I was only able
>to find this on the SMTP and POP3 protocols for revolution.
>http://dark.unitz.ca/~shaosean/  It looks like he is still working on
>them...  Has anyone developed these protocols?  I wasn't really looking to
>do the low level part of the programming dealing with the sockets themselves
>as this would probably take me longer than the program itself...  However if
>I did decide to work on this... Is there aywhere I could look for
>information on developing these?

As far as I know, those are the best examples of the protocols. I've seen other examples of Shao Sean's work, and the code is extremely clean and well-thought-out, so I would expect the same with the SMTP and POP3 clients. By the way, I wouldn't worry too much about digging in to the protocols -- generally they're fairly straightforward and well-documented. The RFCs are the place to start.

>In general I like the programming environment of revolution and I definitely
>like the fact that the application can be built for multiple platforms.  I
>also like the fact that it can make use of regular expressions.  Which is a
>big part of perl and I would need for many features I intend to implement...
>Can my application be developed with runtime revolution or would I be better
>looking at a different solution?

Revolution is an excellent candidate for such a solution, for exactly the reasons you've already mentioned.

>Also is there any information on the speed in which revolution can process
>info with regular expressions?  I guess I could write something in perl and
>then write it in revolution and test the speeds but I was wondering if
>anyone had already done this?  Also once an application is developed in
>general is the compiled program faster in revolution or realbasic?  Sorry
>for all the newbie questions....

I haven't done any benchmarks of Revolution vs. Perl, but Revolution is, in general, very fast. I would expect it to hold its own against Perl. Regarding Revolution vs. REALbasic I have done some benchmarks. It depends on the solution being developed. There are areas where REALbasic is faster. Text manipulation certainly isn't one of them. For a program like this, you're better off with Revolution.

Disclaimer: I'm biased. I'm also honest. The above is verifiable.
-- 

regards,

Geoff Canyon
gcanyon at inspiredlogic.com