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Software Spotlight

You Say You Want a Runtime Revolution?

  • By John K. Waters
  • 10/02/08

The founders of Scottish dev tool maker Runtime Revolution (RR) might be accused of engaging in a bit of high-tech hyperbole with the claim that their latest product offering is "the world's easiest programming tool." But the Edinburgh-based company is pulling out all the stops to throw a spotlight on the usability of its just-released Revolution 3.0.

Revolution is a commercial, cross-platform rapid application development (RAD) environment based on HyperTalk, a high-level programming language first created in 1987. It was originally used with Apple Computer's HyperCard media program. (Oft-forgotten Apple Co-Founder Mike Markkula is an RR investor.)

What makes Revolution especially friendly to newbies and hobbyists is the language, which relies on plain words and phrases for most of its operations. Casual users, the company said, can ramp up quickly, and advanced users find that "a single Revolution command performs the equivalent work of pages of other kinds of code."

The Revolution architecture is designed to let users write their applications using the platform of their choice and to deploy to virtually any desktop environment. The applications automatically assume the correct appearance and behaviors of the target operating system, the company claims, without special effort on the part of the programmer.

The big upgrade in this release is the tool's script editor, said RR's CEO Kevin Miller. "This is where our customers live," he said. "So improvements to the script editor are felt most directly. They really make a huge difference."

The new version of the tool integrates coding and debugging tools in a customizable way that is "robust, efficient and understandable," Miller added

Along with a bunch of bug fixes, the list of new features in this version of the tool also includes some graphics enhancements, among them, seven types of programmable gradient fills and strokes for vector objects. Version 3.0 also comes with nested, multidimensional arrays and a resource center stocked with hundreds of examples "to help new users get up to speed quickly," the company said.

Revolution 3.0 is available in three editions: Revolution Enterprise for professional programmers, Revolution Studio for consultants and business managers, and Revolution Media for beginners and hobbyists.

The company was founded in 1997 to focus on bringing user-centric software development to all major platforms, Miller said, including Windows, Macintosh, Linux and Unix.

A free trial version is available now for download here.

About the Author

John K. Waters is a freelance journalist and author based in Palo Alto, CA.

Comments

Tue, Feb 16, 2010 David Burleigh denver, co

As far as I'm concerned Runtime Revolution is crap. I've been fighting with these people for years just to get a distribution that actually works. It crashes my computer every 15 minutes or so (and I'm using Ubuntu, that should be impossible) and the software doesn't even connect to ODBC databases as documented. Further, they refuse to fix the problem. All they want me to do is to upgrade to a newer version. Why should I have to upgrade to a newer version, if the basic features of the version I purchased don't even work. ODBC Connectivity is a basic necessity and has been around since at least version 2.0; there is no reason why I shouldn't be able to connect to a database. Stay as far away from RunRev as possible. You might want to try flex.

Wed, Dec 30, 2009 David Beck

Rotunda Software has been developing commercial applications built with RunRev for 10 years, and it far exceeded all of our expectations. It has opened doors that we would have never had access to using other environments. The speed of development and the ability to jump between platforms using a single code base (Win / Mac clients and Linux on the server side) have been invaluable. http://w DOT ww.ministryschedulerpro.com http://w DOT ww.volunteerschedulerpro.com

Wed, Aug 12, 2009

Hi All- Is Greg clueless...??? [No hard feelings Greg] Many controversial statements here, however overly factual as life may be in the IT world... If REV were truly a house of cards it would have surely fallen by now. We are looking at over 10 solid years of commercial and university use. Moreso, if REV were running a violation of use we would not have Apple CEO being a party to the company's demise. Gregs note: REV [violates a "precedence rule" in that it operates over the top of both Microsoft and Apple's operating system hierarchy. The professor said that so doing may cause incompatibility problems thus making programs potentially unstable and unsafe. Does Runtime Revolution violate Microsoft License? I would imagine this to be true. Microsoft would be opposed to having programs run on top of it OS.] FACT: MS and/or Apple would have brought serious legal attention to REV by now and seeing that nothing of the sort in over 10 has provoke either of MS , Apple, Sun, Intel, Motorola to do so gives me great confidence that REV has no fear of these foolish statements. I saw- CODE ON!!! Bill Stone

Fri, Jun 19, 2009 Chipp Walters USA

As someone who has developed and delivers multiple commercial and enterprise applications for the past 8 years, I must concur with Richard Gaskin-- no other tool we use at Altuit has come close in speed of delivery for our clients with an emphasis on robust performance. We are currently working on a huge 3-tier application with RunRev as the client software managing emergency situations for the State of Texas. I suppose if you wish to trust a CS student's professor who obviously has never used Rev regarding the "precedence rule" then you would say essentially the same thing for other cross-platform Flash, AJAX libraries, and many other 4G programming environments. What I'm sure he's referring to is RunRev's ability to encapsulate it's own widgets rather than using one's provided by the OS'es standard API. By doing so, RunRev truly is a 'write once deploy many' environment where cross-platform client coding is super simple. I've had zero problems with robustness-- though I'm sure, just like any programming language, Rev can be made to crash when improperly coded. I suspect if I were reading these comments, I'd tend to believe those who make a living using RunRev versus a college student's professor's opinion. BTW, I have spent a number of years on our University's technical advisor board dealing with college professors in the past. They can have a difficult time keeping up with an ever changing landscape of technology, managing current course content and students, not to mention staying themselves current on all the latest software advances. Regarding the Microsoft license issue..Huh? Does Flash also violate this? Does Greg have a clue what he's talking about? House of Cards? It's clear Greg has a bone to pick with this company-- which is of course his right. That said, I would certainly look at the body of work created by RunRev before accepting his word at seemingly face-value.

Fri, Jun 19, 2009 Jerry Daniels Austin, TX

I have been using Revolution for almost ten years now and have found it very useful in providing my clients with high performance, stable applications that run great on both Mac and Windows machines. I have also created commercial applications using it. There is no dev environs I've seen that can rival it.

Fri, Jun 19, 2009 Richard Gaskin Los Angeles

For the software products we've delivered here at FourthWorld.com no other tool we've worked with in our 15 years in business has provided a higher ROI.

Sun, May 31, 2009 Greg Stewart Tacoma, WA

I read that you have evaluated RunTime Revolution. OrbiterLLC.com used the product for an application for three years with disappointing results for our RFID application. Previously in other successful applications we have used a variety of other standard and public programs languages such as Pearl, C++ and Java.

A young intern from the University of Washington told me that his Computer Science professor told him, that RunRev violates a "precedence rule" in that it operates over the top of both Microsoft and Apple's operating system hierarchy. The professor said that so doing may cause incompatibility problems thus making programs potentially unstable and unsafe.

Does Runtime Revolution violate Microsoft License? I would imagine this to be true. Microsoft would be opposed to having programs run on top of it OS.

I am wondering if the quirkiness and fragility we experienced with Orbiter partially has something to do with this.

What is unique about our application is that we communicate to RFID readers and gain data at unpredictable times.

Runrev consultive programmers were never able to solve the data problem. We used Runtime Revolutions own people to write the program.

It also seems that RunRev does not have an extensive library of common routines for connecting to disparate devices or manipulating date time data.

It seems optimized for gamming or for electrical engineers who do not know how to program to make a proof of concept initially work. However, you have product that connects to devices it is possible that RunRev the right fit.
I wonder if RunRev is it not appropriate for building a functional consumer hardware product? I read that Runrev slows down when too many of it’s programming cards are used, and if true is a sure limitation to growing a consumer product's future functionality.

Is Runtime Revolution a "house of cards” method of programming? The larger the build the more fragile the outcome. The cards then come crashing down?

Supporting this is Runrevs own Programmers who have expressed frustration and inability to document the program properly as the size has increased. This does not make sense to me, but I will take it at face value.

I am interested in your response. This is because Runtime Revolution may be great for some applications, and not for others. Publically knowing the strengths and limitation is important so programmers may succeed, and not drawing potential customer in without knowing both.

If any of the above is true, knowing the truth helps people It prevents financial loss, lost time, and most important “safety”. As all programmers are aware, using a program wrongly can literally “physically harm” when used for “batch / processing, device control” in manufacturing.

I am interested in your response. Thank you.

Best,
Greg Stewart

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