News from L3 Technologies

April 9, 1999
L3 Technologies announces the availability of their dBASE & Paradox Database Drivers for Clarion 5. The Drivers are written using the TopSpeed File Driver Kit, ensuring complete compatibility with Clarion. Database access is achieved using the Borland Database Engine (BDE). This is the same engine that is used in the dBASE and Paradox Database systems, so full compatibility is ensured.
All L3 Database Drivers are now available as Standard and Professional variants. In short the existing drivers have undergone a name change and we have released an entry-level variant with some of the advanced features removed:

Standard variants of the L3 Database Drivers are fully functional, entry-level drivers providing full native access to tables through the BDE.
Professional variants of the L3 Database Drivers incorporate new technology (The MetaProperty Extensions) which enables applications to dynamically create, open and access tables without defining the file structure at compile time. This enables developers to produce general-purpose applications that can operate on any dBASE or Paradox table. Full support for Local SQL is provided through the use of the Prop:SQL file property. Support for Query By Example (QBE) is provided by a Prop:QBE property. In addition a special form of file declaration, is supported which allows the efficient use of SQL style cursors in applications.

Full details are available on products page.

All L3 software is now available for purchase via ESD (Electronic Software Distribution). The service is provided by our UK distributor Grey Matter Ltd.. You may download the drivers from our ESD page which also describes the service in detail and offers a demonstration.

January 4, 1999
L3 Technologies is pleased to announce that the dBASE File Driver for Clarion for Windows has now been released.
    The dBASE File Driver will continue to be offered at the discounted price (20% off the normal price of 155 GBP) until the end of January 1999.
    The dBASE File Driver and the Paradox File Driver will be bundled together for the purpose of distribution, though they will be licensed separately.
    Current users of the Paradox File Driver may be pleased to note that there have been some minor improvements to the documentation that ships with the new bundle.
    Furthermore the DBInfo diagnostic utility and the PDXFix table repair utility have now been released with full source code to allow customisation or improvement. These utilities have been developed with Borland C++ 5.0 which is required in order to rebuild the utilities. The source for these utilities will be included in the bundle, though the latest versions will also appear separately on our web site.

November 9, 1998
L3 Technologies releases BETA 3 of the dBASE File Driver for Clarion 4 and Clarion for Windows 2.00x. This is the final BETA version of the driver and is offered for sale at 20% off the cost of the final release version of the software until the final release version is available. The driver itself is code complete, there will be some minor modifications and additions to the accompanying documentation and utilities before the final release.
    The main features of the new release are FoxPro support (32-bit driver only with BDE 3.0 or above) and the fact that the driver has completed validation. In addition a number of fixes and improvements have been made, full details are in the supplied README.TXT.
    Beta versions of the driver are available from our download page.

October 12, 1998
L3 Technologies releases BETA 2 of the dBASE File Driver for Clarion 4 and Clarion for Windows 2.00x. The main features of the new version are dBASE 7 support, full import capability and numerous other fixes and improvements.
    A new example program DBF2TXD provides a simple means to create Data Dictionaries from dBASE tables.
    Beta versions of the driver are available from our download page.

August 27, 1998
L3 Technologies starts beta-testing the dBASE File Driver for Clarion 4 and Clarion for Windows 2.00x. The dBASE File Driver is based on the same code base as the Paradox File Driver and shares the same advanced features.
    The Driver currently supports dBASE versions 3 to 5 and support is expected to be added for dBASE 7 and FoxPro 2.6.
    Beta versions of the driver are available from our download page.

July 6, 1998
We have given our web site a major facelift. One reason for the change is to accomodate our new web site design services. However, we have also made an effort to make it even easier to locate items of interest by improving the overall structure.

April 9, 1998
L3 Technologies has arranged for Downsizing Systems GmbH to sell and support our software throughout Germany. Downsizing Systems GmbH also distribute TopSpeed software and offer selected development systems and tools for software developers and power users. Full contact details are on our Suppliers page.

April 2, 1998
L3 Technologies releases the Paradox File Driver for C4. The new driver incorporates a revision of the Meta Properties which allows developers to take advantage of new features in Clarion 4 to further ease dynamic file loading and creation.

February 27, 1998
L3 Technologies releases the Paradox File Driver for CW2. A C4 version is in the final stages of development.

December 16, 1997
L3 Technologies makes available a small number of freeware programming tools. We are also establishing a series of short articles on general Clarion programming issues.

December 1, 1997
L3 Technologies Paradox File Driver (BETA 1) for Clarion for Windows 2.00x is released. The driver is freely available to anyone who wishes to beta-test or evaluate the driver for their own use.
    This initial release is 16-bit only and comes complete with the Borland Database Engine redistributables. 32-bit support will be available in a subsequent release.
    Download the latest version from our download page now!