DUNOD2015 SQLfast

SQLfast versions

• v5.1 (2023-06-04) description
• v5.0 (2022-12-12) description
• v4.1 (2022-07-02) description
• v4.0 (2020-12-04) description
• v3.2 (2019-09-01) description
• v3.1.1 (2019-05-22) description
• v3.1 (2019-02-01) description
• v3.0.1 (2018-12-04) description
• v3.0 (2018-11-01) description
• v2.1.3 (2018-03-02) description
• v2.1.2 (2017-10-17) description
• v2.1.1 (2017-10-06) description
• v2.1 (2017-09-10) description
• v2.0 (2017-04-01) description
• v1.2.2 (2016-05-22) description
• v1.2.1 (2016-05-09) description
• v1.0.1 (2016-01-14) description
• v1.0.0 (2015-12-18) description

SQLfast and SQLpy are the main technical outcomes of a didactic project intended to explore and demonstrate the power of database concepts, technologies and methods for general problem solving. These tools are currently being used to develop a series of (very) varied case studies designed to assess the power of these concepts (SQLfast Case Studies).

The name SQLfast denotes,

• on the one hand, a programming language allowing the rapid and easy development of interactive, data-centered scripts,
• and, on the other hand, a graphical, user-friendly software environment to develop, test and run SQLfast scripts.

The language and its environment have been designed to encompass a wide range of usage scenarios, from database self-study by beginners to the development and exploitation of complex database applications such as library management and prototype generation. They target both novice and professional users.

The core of the SQLfast language is SQL, the universal language for database definition and manipulation. Any sequence of SQL statements is a valid SQLfast script, whatever its length. SQLfast also comprises statements that provide for graphical user interaction, text generation, file manipulation, decision, iteration, web access, metadata processing and much more.

The main design goal of the SQLfast language is simplicity. Just like its kernel, SQL, it exhibits a smooth learning curve: a simple problem can be solved by a simple script of 2-3 statements, the writing of which requires a few minutes of learning. The complexity of data interaction (DB, web, files, images, etc.) and that of GUI are fully hidden from the script writer. For instance, extracting and formatting data from the database requires about 40 Java/JDBC statements but only one SQLfast statement. A 3-field data entry dialogue box is built through more than 100 Python/Tkinter statements but requires one SQLfast statement only. In the same way, downloading a file from the web needs one SQLfast statement, against more than 100 Python/urllib2 statements. This document compares the SQLfast code for these three examples with their equivalent standard code.

One of the distinctive features of SQLfast is its tutorial engine. A tutorial (or guide or help document) is a multimedia hypertext written in the SQLtuto language (think of it as a micro-HTML that can be learned in a few minutes). This document is active, in that, any code fragment (SQL queries, SQLfast scripts, GUI, calling a procedure) can be executed from within the tutorial in which it appears. In particular, it allows the development of complex active course systems quite easily.

The SQLfast software is portable and its installation cannot be simpler: folder SQLfast extracted from the .zip archive that contains its complete distribution, can be copied anywhere and is ready to run. In addition, SQLfast does not modify any system parameter.

To address the large range of usage it is intended for, SQLfast offers two interfaces:

• Basic: familiarisation with database concepts, direct graphical manipulation of data, learning SQL, analyzing data, solving small problems.
• Expert: learning database programming, developing and running small applications, solving more complex problems, developing and running complex (possibly standalone) applications.

The SQLfast software is both small (32 MB) and self-contained. Its standard distribution includes a graphical library, a RDBMS, a large, extendible, function library, sample databases, help files, tutorials and a large portfolio of example scripts, ranging from two-statement elementary scripts to one thousand statements interactive DB interface generator.

SQLfast has been developed in Python. The current distribution includes SQLite 3, which offers a rich version of SQL2/SQL3 (including recursive CTE and window function) and GUI library Tkinter. It has been compiled for MS Windows. SQLfast runs smoothly on Linux under Wine (some parameters may need to be adapted, such as default paths and character coding).

The distribution package is available as a 'zip' archive. It comprises the SQLfast software (including 80 guides and tutorials, sample databases and more than 300 scripts) and three small documents: an Installation guide and the Getting started guides for the Basic and Expert levels.

• SQLfast software. This archive contains a folder named SQLfast. The installation merely consists in extracting this folder and placing it anywhere in the computer. SQLfast is then ready to run: just double-clicking on SQLfast.exe file. The archive is available here.
• SQLfast installation guide. This (practically useless!) document provides some hints on how to prepare SQLfast for execution. It can also be found here.
• Getting started in SQLfast. How to start with SQLfast. It can also be found here for the Basic level and here for the Expert level.

There are two main sources of documentation describing the SQLfast software and languages: integrated and external.

• the integrated documentation is accessed through button Help at the Basic level and through Help menu function at the Expert Level.
• the external documentation comprises a series of pdf documents, the most useful of which are the SQLfast manual (SQL-Manual.pdf) and the SQLfast command dictionary (SQLfast-Commands.pdf).

• 4.1 Help button at the "Basic" Level.

This button opens a short menu with three items, in addition to the Welcome screen (About SQLfast).

• Help > Getting started. This document describes the basic graphical environment and the main functions of SQLfast. Also available as a pdf document of the external documentation.
• Help > SQLfast environment. Detailed technical description of the windows of SQLfast and of their functions. Also available as a pdf document of the external documentation.
• Help > Tutorials. Portfolio of tutorials on the SQL language. Partly translated from the French reference book Bases de données - Concepts, utilisation et développement, 5th Edition, Dunod 2022.

• 4.2 Help menu at the "Expert" Level.

This button opens a menu with four items, in addition to the Welcome screen (About SQLfast).

• Help > Getting started. This document describes the expert graphical environment and the main functions of SQLfast. Also available as a pdf document of the external documentation..
• Help > Survival guide. A collection of about fifty commented SQLfast programming models, from simple data querying to code generation based on metadata. Can be used, assembled and customized to develop real applications. Also available as a pdf document of the external documentation (Survival_guide_EN)
• Help > SQLfast references. Portfolio of reference documents about the SQLfast software and languages.

• SQLfast environment. Detailed technical description of the windows of SQLfast and of their functions at the Expert Level. Also available as a pdf document of the external documentation.
• SQLfast commands. Dictionary of the SQLfast statements, functions and parameters. This integrated document is a summary of Dictionary of SQLfast commands and parameters (SQLfast commands)
• SQLtuto language. Description of the tutorial language. This language allows users to modify and develop help documents and tutorials for the SQLfast environment.

• Help > Tutorials. Portfolio of tutorials about SQL and the SQLfast language. These lessons are derived from the SQLfast Manual.

• 4.3 The SQLfast Manual. This e-book is a manual/tutorial on the SQLfast language and on database programming. It is available here. In addition, a series of case studies is available [here].

Most integrated documents are available in English and in French. The English documents are located in the directory SQLfast/SQLfastHelp_EN.

SQLpy is a module intended to provide Python programmers with a another way to rapidly and easily develop small interactive and data intensive applications while ignoring the intricacies of the tkinter and sqlite3 standard modules. It includes some of the most powerful facilities of the SQLfast language and environment. SQLpy comprises three parts: GUI, Console and Database.

• The GUI part offers a collection of functions that create dialog boxes made up of the most common widgets of the tkinter Python module. It includes eight box families: Infobox, Entrybox, Textbox, Picturebox, Listbox (two variants), Checkbox and Radiobox. The Compositebox combines any number of instances of these basic types. Each box is created by a single Python statement (equivalent to one hundred native Python/tkinter instructions).

• The Console is an independent window in which text can be written (and read) by the program and the user. It is somewhat similar to the Python system console except that it is entirely controlled by the Python program.

• The Database part provides a simplified access to the resources of a relational database (e.g., no connection, no cursors). Besides usual elementary operations (CRUD), it includes some powerful functions, such as exporting the content of a database, importing and analyzing external data, formatting the result set of "select" queries (an extendible collection of 16 formats is available) and extracting metadata.

The distribution includes

• the code of the SQLpy module (SQLpy.py)
• its user manual (SQLpy - User Manual.pdf)
• a small Python program that illustrates the use of the SQLpy functions (SQLpy_Demonstrator.py)
• as an illustration, a rewriting in Python/SQLpy of the SQLfast application associated with the case study Four days to save the library (Project_1_-_The_Library_(SQL).py).

The last version of SQLpy (SQLpy v1.2) comprises the following extensions:

• it no longer requires the installation of the PIL module (but then, handles only the limited bitmap formats of tkinter: gif, pgm et ppm)
• allows CompositeBox to include multiple instances of SelectList2 elementary boxes (only one in version 1.1)

The module and its documentation are available here

SQLfast versions

• v5.1 (2023-06-04)

• Case studies

• Classifying objects: tutorial and application of FCA (Formal Concept Analysis).

• v5.0 (2022-12-12)

• SQLfast functions for Python programmers

• SQLpy is a Python module that provides the Python programmer with nearly 40 of the most important SQLfast functions (including 12 high level GUI dialog boxes, 7 console management procedures and 17 database operations).

• SQLfast utilities

• UTIL-SELECT-parameters-standard-3: new, more eye-catching output format for select queries (same as UTIL-SELECT-parameters-standard-1 with continuous lines).

• SQLfast system

• the code of the GUI engine has been rewritten (now similar to that of SQLpy)

• SQLfast functions (UDF)

• New optimistic execution mode for list processing UDF functions. The default coding mode of UDF functions is defensive, the user being considering highly unreliable. Their execution is (hopefully) secure but may be slow. With the optimistic coding, (almost) no arguments are validated nor converted. The execution of function is less secure but much faster (2 to 10 times). The execution mode is specified by system variable itemSpeed: 0 = secure, 1 = fast.
• New UDF function translate: transforms a character string through a character conversion dictionary (implementation of the SQL standard function, missing in SQLite).
• New UDF function itemTranslate: extension of the translate function; transforms a character string through a substring conversion dictionary.
• New UDF function num2uni(N): given integer N, returns the unicode character of code-point N..

• Guides and Help documents

The color rendering can be very different depending on the screen settings. It can now be customized by two new system variables:

• colorHelp: document background color (default grey96)
• colorHelpScript: embedded script background color (default light yellow)

• SQLfast GUI

• two new dialog boxes: selectList (multiselection in a single list box) and selectList2 (same as selectList but with dual list boxes)
• askData: the width of the entry fields is customizable for each box instance individually through local parameter /x
• showMessage (aka pause): the text style now is fully customizable thanks to three new infoFont, infoWeight and infoWrap system variables
• showPicture: can now handle a wider variety of image formats (like gif, jpg, tiff, etc.)
• showDrawing: the Print function stores the *ps files in the Files directory
• askData and selectList, the constant separator symbol is customizable via the constSeparator system variable (useful when the constants include the separator)
• askCombo (composite boxes): in addition to layout operators | and ||, a new operator (|||) removes the constraints of the former versions

• Show schema

• display of the Summary and Full schema of in-memory databases
• automatic generation of the DDL code of in-memory databases

• New active tutorials

• New tutorial on SQL Data Analytics (60 pages, more than 60 executable SQL examples). This tutorial derives from the new Chapter 10 of the reference book. Available in two versions, French and English.
• In the Basic interface, English version: six new SQL tutorials (Cyclic structures, Data modification, Complements, SQL views, Recursive queries, OLAP).

• and more ...

• v4.1 (2022-07-02)

• Tutorials

• New tutorial on Data Analytics (60 pages, more than 60 executable SQL examples) in two versions, French and English. This tutorial derives from the new Chapter 10 of the reference book.
• Nouveau tutoriel sur l'Analyse de données (60 pages, plus de 60 exemples SQL exécutables) en deux versions, française et anglaise. Ce tutoriel est basé sur le nouveau chapitre 10 de l'ouvrage de référence.

• System

• Last stable version of SQLite (v3.38.5)

• v4.0 (2020-12-05)

• The distribution

Available in two versions, depending on the default language of the documentation:

Disponible en deux versions, selon la langue par défaut de la documentation:

• English, when downloaded from the English section of this page,
• Française, si téléchargée à partir de la section française de cette page.

Note: these versions are identical except for the value of parameter helpDirectory in initialization file SQLfast.ini.

• Case studies

• Active Databases: tutorial and application (92 pages). Includes an experiment on program-less business application architecture and a discussion on trigger validation.
• Four hours to save the library: this Case study has been translated into two executable tutorials, one as a narrative presentation of the case study and the other one devoted to the user of the application. Other case studies may be translated this way in the future.

• SQLfast Manual. Two new chapters

• Chapter 23 - Aid to SQLfast script development (24 pages). Includes a discussion on how to generate execution traces and how to exploit them.
• Chapter 26 - Developing a tutorial (34 pages). Includes an in-depth description of embedded scripts.

• SQLfast language

• New SQL object generated columns (columns the value of which is computed from other column values of the same row).
• New statement trace on/off, to start/disable tracing
• New function webLib:disableCertficate to disable certificate verification
• New output format for select result sets, UTIL-SELECT-parameters-for-headers.sql, to generate the column names only

• Show_Data subsystem

• Data windows now independent of (i.e., do not block any longer) the Main and Output windows.
• Insertion of a series of rows with selected value propagation.
• Data modification also allowed in Expert mode (algorithms rewritten to minimize access conflicts).

• SQLfast GUI

• Improved GUI in Main window, Show_Data, Show_Schema (notably, Entry and Message fields are resizable)
• Parameter charSize now effective (character size in Main and Output windows, useful for high definition screens)
• New item Help > Case studies to accommodate new case studies tutorials.
• Menu Script restructured: items redundant with buttons removed, new item Tracing.

• Dialog boxes

• Customized widget colors now allowed.
• Data fields, text fields and composite boxes now resizable
• Readability problems fixed in check and radio buttons against dark background (overwhelming another Tkinter idiosyncrasy!).

• Help/tutorial

• The tutorials of the Basic level now include a short introduction to SQL (both in English and in French)
• Insertion of jpeg/jpg images allowed in addition to the gif format.
• Size of large images can be controlled through tutoImageMaxSize system variable.
• New SQLtuto concept: embedded script.

• An embedded script is an SQLfast procedure integrated to a tutorial document. Several attributes are associated with this script: Id, name, execute button, legend. All of these components can be hidden. An embedded script can call other scripts of the same document. This concept blurs the frontier between executable code and its documentation. It allows the creation of a tutorial that includes the code it describes. Many tutorials have been rewritten based on this feature.
• embedded scripts are controlled by four SQLtuto commands: .script:, .endscript:, .loadscripts:, .scriptMaxHeight:
• All the tutorials of the distribution have been rewritten to include embedded scripts.

• SQLfast functions (UDF)

• durationSeconds: computes the interval between two timestamps, down to the millisecond.
• printMessage: from an SQL query (notably within a trigger body), writes a text in the output window.
• writeFile: from an SQL query (notably within a trigger body), creates a file and writes a text in it.
• writeTrace: from an SQL query (notably within a trigger body), inserts the trace of the execution of an SQLfast statement in tracing database TRACING.db.
• head: returns the first word of a sentence.
• tail: returns a sentence, minus its head.

• SQLfast system

• Tracing subsystem: stores in a tracing database (TRACING.db) the complete data on SQLfast statement execution. Includes the statements executed by triggers (through UDF function writeTrace).
• Includes SQLite v3.33 (64 bits)
• Several instances of SQLfast are allowed to simultaneously run on the same database.
• New, much faster, implementation of SQL-for loops. Linear time instead of quadratic.
• New system variables:

• traceActive, traceSQL, traceAppend, loaderDebug: control the tracing subsystem
• tutoImageMaxSize: sets the maximum size of bitmap images in tutorials
• widget colors setting: colorMainFrame, colorInfoBox, colorGeneralMessage, colorBoxFrame, colorBoxMessage, colorEntry, colorEntryField, colorEntryDisplay, colorTextUpdate, colorTextDisplay, colorCheck, colorRadio, colorButton.

• bugs fixed

• v3.2 (2019-09-01)

• Case studies (Text and full applications)

• Blockchains: tutorial (28 pages), application (11 modules)
• Temporal databases: Parts 1 and 2 (124 pages), application (27 modules)

• Main window menu

• new operation: General > Play SQLdraw (display an SQLdraw script)

• SQLfast language

• New system variables: clock, dateclock, DBMSversion
• print statement modified: now always writes in the output window, whatever the current output channel
• showDrawing: new functions in the graphical interface: Pause, Resume, Next-step
• showPicture: now displays gif and jpeg file

• SQLfast functions (UDF)

• durationDays: number of days between two dates or timestamps
• toverlap: check whether temporal closed-open intervals overlap

• System

• new library LTemp: temporal engine implementing main operators for temporal databases processing (projection, reduction, outer join, aggregation, valued stable intervals, normalization, etc.)
• vector-graphics engine drawLib:

• new command display <text>: displays a text in the message field of the interface
• new command delete <shape-name>: delete an arbitrary shape
• new command step: defines a shape sequences
• commands rectangle and circle implemented
• engine rewritten: now displays about 20,000 large solid rectangles per second

• new system variables

• clock: time in day in format 'hh:m:ss'
• dateclock: date + time in format 'yyy-mm-dd hh:m:ss'

• Bug fixed in: UDF setDCol, random_i(v1,v2), DBF import, CreateDB InMemory in Level 0, SQL update of dynamic columns, menu item General/Save as (no more crash for some non-Unicode text file), showText (now displays full first line), showPicture (no more crashes for very long file path), decoding dynaColumn parameter

• v3.1.1 (2019-05-22)

• System:

• bug fixed in drop view execution (incorrect processing of view metadata).
• bug fixed in import from dbf files (last field incorrectly decoded if variable-length numeric).
• bug fixed in createDB InMemory in Basic level.

• v3.1 (2019-01-31)

• Language:

• Multidatabase scripts: secondary databases can be attached to the main database.

format: generic attach 'D:/SQLfast/Databases/CLICOM.db' as CLI;

usage: select * from CLI.DETAIL;

• New temporal system variables: clock (hh:mm:ss), dateclock (YYYY-MM-DD hh:mm:ss)

• Data dictionary:

• System tables: three new system tables: SYS_CHECK (check constraints), SYS_TRIGGER (the properties of triggers) and SYS_TRIGGER_COMP (the SQL statements of the body of triggers).
• New properties: key and constraint names, autoincrement columns.

• Generating the SQL-DDL schema

• Expert level menu: new menu item to force the rebuilding of the full schema of the current database.
• Generation process: now generates check constraints, views, triggers, key and constraint names.

• Case study and documentation: new case study on Blockchains.

• Documentation: Principles of Blockchains and description of an experimental Blockchain toolkit (in English). Text: [].
• Scripts: The code of the toolkit is available in SQLfast/Scripts/Case-Studies/Case_BlockChain of the standard distribution.

• System: upgraded to SQLite v.3.25.03. (includes, a.o., window function and an upsert variant of the insert query)

• v3.0.1 (2018-12-04)

• Cryptography: cryptographic functions have been added to the LStr library: secure hashing (hash, miningHash), symmetric cryptography (generateSYMkey, encryptSYM, decryptSYM), asymmetric cryptography (generateRSAkeys, encryptRSA, decryptRSA); document SQLfast-commands.pdf updated.
• Blockchain application

• Scripts: a didactic Blockchain toolkit has been added in directory Scripts/BD-2018/Chapitre-10/Blockchain. Dialogues in French. An English version is ongoing as an SQLfast Case Study.

• Documentation: the documentation of the Blockchain toolkit has been added to Appendix 10 of the reference book (Chapitre 10, Annexe). In French. An English version is ongoing as an SQLfast Case Study.

• v3.0 (2018-11-01)

• SQL extension:

• List processing: complete module, including (multi-)set operators and predicates, joins (joining two lists) and list-based loop (for e = [items A;B;C;D];). This feature simplifies complex queries based on set-algebra and speed up their execution.
• Dynamic columns: the basis of NoSQL databases. An undeclared column is created as soon as it receives a value (through insert or update). For instance, the following sequence is valid: create table T(A int, B int); insert into T(A,B,C) values (1,2,3); update T set D = 4 where E is null; select A,B,C,E,F from T;. Metadata functions return the list of non null dynamic columns of a row or of a table.

• SQLfast functionalities:

• import statement: CSV import is more robust: now copes with values including end-of-lines and with record comprising a variable number of fields.
• Basic level: in-memory databases can now be created.

• GUI:

• composite dialogue boxes: now stretchable; their resizing is propagated to their elementary boxes.
• result sets of select queries and Show Data windows now correctly display text values including end-of-lines.

• Show Schema:

• Summary schema: now shows not null constraints.
• Full schema: when missing, the SQL-DDL code is automatically rebuilt.

• Documentation:

• Survival guide: available in English (both *.help and *.pdf version)
• Survival guide: extended to list processing and dynamic columns
• SQLfast manual (formerly SQLfast Tutorial): new Chapter 24 - Transient data: the SQLfast lists
• SQLfast manual: new Chapter 25 - Schema-less tables and dynamic columns
• SQLfast manual: Appendix - A basket of examples: new applications added (Simulation of all (multi-)set operators, Computing the powerset of a set, The relational division, Computing set inclusion relation, etc.)

• System:

• several bugs fixed and minor improvements.

• v2.1.3 (2018-03-02)

• UDF functions (for SQLfast and SQL):

• list processing: set-like operators ("itemUnion", "itemExcept", "itemInter") similar to SQL set operators "union", "except" and "intersect". Multiset-like operators ("itemUnionAll", "itemExceptAll", "itemInterAll") similar to SQL multiset operators "union all", "except all" and "intersect all".
• list processing: set-like predicates ("itemEqual", "itemInclude"). Multiset-like predicates ("itemEqualAll", "itemIncludeAll").

• GUI:

• Error box more readable: stretchable and in "courier' font
• Stretchable dialogue boxes: all the elementary boxes (showMessage, askData, askText, selectOne, selectMany, showData, showText, showPicture, showDrawing) now are stretchable.

• language:

• "print" can be used instead of "write"; Christmas gift for Python programmers!

• system:

• Some bugs fixed

• v2.1.2 (2017-10-17)

• UDF functions (for SQLfast and SQL):

• Clarification of UDF architecture. "UserUDFlib_for_SQL.py" is the module in which new UDF to be used in SQL queries must be written by users. Similarly, new UDF for SQLfast statements ("if", "while", "compute") must now be written in module "UserUDFlib_for_SQLfast.py". The source and compiled versions of these modules are integrated to the distribution. NOTE: Chapters 10 and 22 of the tutorial are not updated yet.

• v2.1.1 (2017-10-06)

• New UDF functions (for SQLfast and SQL):

• list processing: itemSlice (extracting sublist) + itemSliceS; itemDelete (remove elements) + itemDeleteS; item and itemSlice now allow backward positions; itemSort, itemNSort,itemSortS and itemNSortS receive a new parameter to remove duplicates

• system:

• Some minor bugs fixed

• Case studies:

• New case study Interactive SQL interpreters available. Its scripts have been included in the distribution.

• v2.1 (2017-09-10)

• New UDF functions (for SQLfast and SQL):

• list processing: itemSort (sorting items), itemNSort (numeric sorting of items) + itemSortS, itemNSortS

• New external functions:

• pretty printing of select queries: LStr:PrettyPrint

• SQLfast language:

• execApp: arguments are passed by reference instead of by value (avoid "newline" problems)
• exceptions in UDF: specific exception messages now transmitted in clear

• GUI:

• data and text dialogue boxes: now stretchable (except in askCombo)
• background color in predefined values: the ugly gray color is back! Now fixed.

• system:

• New architecture of UDF functions. Built-in and user libraries are now distinct.
• Several bugs fixed

• Case studies:

• The text of nine case studies have been rewritten and extended. Their scripts have been redeveloped and integrated in the distribution (new directory SQLfast/Scripts/Case-Studies). They are available as complete, standalone, applications, ready to run.

• v2.0 (2017-04-01)

• New functions (for SQLfast and SQL):

• date/time processing: normDate, datePattern, julianDate
• types: isDate, isNotDate, isInteger, isNotInteger, utf8Compliant, latinCompliant, hexCompliant, base64Compliant
• string analysis and reduction: startsWith, endsWith, countInst, deaccent, reduce, simplify, shrink
• format: thousandSep
• path/url processing: urlExists, normalizePath, lastPathNode, pathPrefix, nodeExtension, pureNodeName
• structured text analysis: ExtractTaggedString, NextSection
• list processing: itemLen, item, itemIndex
• secure hashing (based on SHA256): hash (string digest), hashFile (file digest)
• group_concat2: full group_concat aggregate function, equivalent to MySQL version. For SQL only.

• New SQLfast statements::

• web interaction: webfileToFile, webpageToVariable
• multi-variable assignment: set
• csv and dbf data exchange: import
• secure hashing: hashFile (file digest), from small to very large files

• New SMTP functions:

• SQLfast: openSMTPserver, sendMessage, closeSMTPserver, sendMessageImmediate
• SQL: sendMail

• New coding statements and functions:

• hash signature: hash, hashFile
• encode/decode: b64encode, b64decode, b64encode<source>To<target>, b64decod<source>To<target>, char2hex, hex2char, HEXencode<source>To<target>, HEXdecode<source>To<target>
• cryptography: encrypt, decrypt

• Data windows: improved readability through new background, update/delete through double-click, showing temporary tables and views, coping with binary data
• Miscellaneous:

• Displaying binary data in result sets.
• GUI: name of standard buttons can be customized
• "About" box, more information and links, startup settings.
• Welcome screen = "About" box.

• system: upgraded to Python 2.7.12 and SQLite 3.17.

• v1.2.2 (2016-05-22)

• system: Bug fixed: the system path (where SQLfast directory is located) may now include non-ASCII characters.

• v1.2.1 (2016-05-09)

• Data windows: Data windows in Show data receive a new button: Select. Allows row filtering. Four filter building modes are provided (smart, strict, SQL condition, SQL predicate).
• Data windows: New sorting criterion: natural (= unsorted).
• Schema window: In addition to the standard Summary format, a new Full schema option is provided. It also shows data types and all integrity constraints. If missing, the Full schema can be regenerated through script SQL-DDL-generation.sql.
• SQLfast language: New statements displayHelp and closeHelp. Allow help documents to be displayed/closed dynamically from within a script.
• SQLfast language: Concise version of ask, askData, ask-u, askData-u, showData. We can now write: ask A,B,C instead of ask A,B,C = A|B|C;
• SQLfast language: New SQL and SQLfast UDF functions: to provide approximate comparison (simplify, shrink); to manipulate paths and urls (normalizePath, lastPathNode, pathPrefix, nodeExtension, pureNodeName); to align a string in a fixed frame (frame)
• SQLfast language: Web processing is now allowed through statements webpageToVariable (download the HTML code of a page) and webfileToFile (download a file). New LStr functions NextSection and ExtractTaggedString can be used to extract data from HTML code.
• SQLfast language: New time processing functions: julianday or jd (convert a date-time value into julian day code), addToDate (add/subtract days to a date), nextDate (next date), prevDate (previous date).
• GUI: All secondary windows (Help, Schema, Data) are now persistent and independent of Main and Output windows.
• GUI: Menu function and button Save have been split into Save and Save as.
• GUI: Useless buttons are now disabled (e.g., Show schema disabled when no database is opened).
• system: Various bugs fixed.

• v1.0.1 (2016-01-14)

• Data windows: Fixing horizontal synchronization of title and data text areas in wide data windows.
• Data windows: Geometry parameters of data windows can now be set in SQLfast.ini and modified in user scripts: maxTableNbr (initial maximum number of tables opened), maxRowNbr (maximum number of rows extracted per table), WmaxRowWidth (max width of data area), WmaxRowNbr (max height of data area).
• SQLfast language: SQLite detects DDL errors involving more than one table in DML queries only. Foreign key errors are now coped with in statement createDictionary.

• v1.0.0 (2015-12-18)

• First public release.