PowerBuilder to ASP.NET [closed]

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I was wondering if anyone has performed a migration from PowerBuilder to ASP.NET? Is this going to be a complete rewrite, is there a list of best practices for performing this type of migration? I personally have never worked with PowerBuilder and any guidance and or suggestions would be appreciated.

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If you have never worked with PowerBuilder but have been tasked with migrating a decently sized application written in it, I would highly suggest you do the following:

1. Schedule a meeting with the project owners.

2. Show up with a blank notebook and pencil / pen.

3. The first question should be: "What do you want the new system to do?"

Go from there...

Migrating a decently sized system to another language is so full of pitfalls a lot of times it's better to wipe the slate and start over... Unless the team is fluent in BOTH languages. Of course, starting over has it's own drawbacks as well. I hope they are prepared to spend a lot of time and money.;)

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I'd suggest

• starting with my previous post on converting PowerBuilder to .NET,
• subtract the DataWindow.NET suggestion (it's been discontinued in favour of control generation from PB.NET 12.5, which is a little steep in price for custom controls),
• then add my opinion that client-server UI design (you don't say whether it's C/S or not, but I'll make that assumption) has different best practices than web design, so a lot of the functionality in the PowerBuilder app should be redesigned for the new platform. (I suggest this to PowerBuilder users even when they're moving to PowerBuilder's WebForms functionality.)

I've seen browsers time out because the developer was loading too many items into a dropdown for a web browser, and while I wouldn't call it optimal for client-server, it didn't bring the UI to a screeching halt.

If you're dead set on this, I'd use your PowerBuilder app as a business definition document, and start budgeting to build from the ground up.

Good luck,

Terry.

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I have converted the powerbuilder 12.1 source into powerbuilder.net it gives you all functionality in web environment but right now its performance is very slow.

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I also did a huge application migration from PB 12.1 to PB.NET. It wasn't easy. I did a heavy use of SetRedraw, and that function is not more available in .NET. After fixing a lot of migrated code, I noticed very low performances compared to PB classic. PB .NET Ide is slower than Visual Studio one, and it allows you to mix PB code with .Net framework code.

After a forecasting cost review, we decided to rewrite a new form application with Visual Studio .NET and it revealed the right choice.