Springbase Blog

Springbase at Startup Weekend

We're excited to announce that we've teamed up with Startup Weekend to sponsor their event in Mountain View, CA on the weekend of Nov. 20th-22nd!

Startup Weekend is an intense three-day event with the goal of "taking local developers, innovators, and entrepreneurs from ideas to launch."  As soon as we heard that, we knew we had to get involved.

We'll be providing access to the Springbase platform to teams building new products from scratch, as well as providing live, on-site support throughout the weekend.  We're looking forward to working together with some very motivated teams to create some very impressive applications.

Want to go but don't have a ticket?  Send us a comment telling us why you want to go and we'll see if we can help get you there.

For more information about the event, check out the Startup Weekend website.

New Feature: Edit Your Page's HTML Source

It's always been easy to use the page designer to create fixed layouts.  But sometimes you need total control over the rendering of your page.  For those developers who are familiar with HTML and markup-based web layout, today we're introducing Flow Layouts. 

Just switch your page's Layout Mode to Flow and you can work directly with the HTML source of your page.  All the familiar Springbase controls are still there and you can access their properties and events directly from the HTML editor.

This new layout mode gives you complete control over the rendering of your page.  Using it together with the CSS stylesheet editor, you can build any web layout you can dream up.

Updated Script Editor

Today we're releasing a re-designed script editor that makes it much easier to develop the scripts for your application.

The new editor makes all aspect of script creation much easier, like adding and removing steps, changing their order, and editing their details.  In general, you'll find that the editor stays out of your way better than before so you can focus on the script itself.

You'll automatically see the new editor when working with existing and new scripts.

Tutorial: Creating Printable Reports

Reporting is a big part of many Springbase apps, and we want to make it as easy to get started as possible.  Today we're publishing a tutorial on creating print-ready reports in Springbase.  The tutorial covers all the basics, showing you how to set up a hierarchy of sections pulling data from your database, and adding totals, sub-totals, and other calculated values.  Finally, the tutorial shows you how to style your reports so they'll look great on the screen and on paper.

What topic would you like to see written up in a tutorial?  Let us know!

New Sample Application: Contact Manager

Keeping with our goal of making it easy for beginners to get up to speed with Springbase, today we're releasing a new sample application.  The Contact Manager app shows off some of the most basic and frequently-used concepts in Springbase, including sub-pages, data binding, event handling, and stylesheets.

If you're wanting to get familiar with Springbase, there's no easier way than to start looking at how a sample application is put together.  Just click Edit on the Contact Manager app to get started.

The Contact Manager sample application is available on all new accounts.

New Developer Documentation

Here's something a lot of people have asked for: an overhaul to Springbase's online developer documentation.  The updated version contains tons of new content and is much easier to use.  Check it out here and let us know what you think.