Visual WebGui Case Studies

"We are able to fairly simply convert Client-Server systems such as this KBIS VB6 code to the Web. This allows us to concentrate mainly on planning the business logic and data logic affecting the GUI." Ofer Kamrat

Overview
About 8 years ago KBIS developed and deployed in 7 of the largest 9 insurance companies in Israel VB6 systems that connect to other internal systems such as claims, policy issuing, supplier management, customer management, billing and archive. Lately a need to convert those systems into a current web based technology raised. The need originated in several major reasons: Microsoft's announcement to stop supporting VB6 and the need to move the system to a supported standard code, the need for a centralized solution for easier maintenance and to allow easy access for a large amount of users without the need for local installations and finally a need to refresh its applicative capabilities.

KBIS who offers those systems to insurance companies in Israel and North America evaluated several Microsoft based alternatives and eventually decided to use the Visual WebGui Platform which was offered by Communitech a Visual WebGui Partner.  

Business Needs
The system manages the business process between the insurance company and its service providers. In order to minimize fiscal damages generated by human errors the system allows issuing orders, payment confirmations, payment orders and ordering services (healthcare services in particular) based on criteria and rules according to a set of instructions created by the company.

KBIS who offers the system to insurance companies in Israel as a service decided to convert the Client-Server systems which were written in VB6 (350,000 lines of code in average) into .NET based Web systems that would allow easy access for end users without the need for local installations but via a simple deployment on the organizations' servers. Due to the nature of the systems it was essential that the web platform it would base on would allow tight information security.

In terms of performance, it was important to put an emphasis on the capability to run hundreds of rules on hundreds of different accounts in a matter of seconds and to allow response times of less than 3 seconds even with up to 500 concurrent users. Additional important requirement was to allow further developments with simple API connection for the SOA and BPM system in those organizations.

The Solution
The technological solution proposed by Communitech was based on Visual WebGui - a platform which Communitech had started working with about 4 years ago when its development team was looking for a control to display schedule. "At the time we were looking for a scheduled box control and DataGrid View that acted as WinForms. I found Visual WebGui and started to look into their examples which proved to work amazingly on the client side," said Ofer Kamrat, Communitech CTO.

In the past few years Communitech developed a tool that generates ORM/EDM and applicative logic from a variety of data sources such as databases, XML and WS. Sooner than later it was obvious that VWG could assist Communitech in fulfilling its technology and easily create a complete applicative environment with features such as Paging, sorting,  Security, Customizations, filters, data amendments, save, permissions, dirty flags, printing, etc.

"When I started to work with Visual WebGui I found out that a Web developer does not have to work on lower level HTML and JavaScript which saves a huge amount of work," Kamrat said and explained that "Working with Visual WebGui is similar to developing Client-Server applications and also shares similar concepts which is the reason that coupled with our tools we are able to fairly simply convert Client-Server systems such as this KBIS VB6 code to the Web. This allows us to concentrate mainly on planning the business logic and data logic affecting the GUI."

Benefits
The conversion project was quickly and cost effectively completed due to the combination of Visual WebGui and the tools and experience of Communitech. The first operational system was fully deployed in the first insurance company in a staggering short period of 6 months including a 3 months testing period in parallel to the previous system. "The conversion improved the performance of the system and its resilience while lowering the operational costs." Horizontal Applications Manager at a company specializing in car, home and health insurance. As a result, those organizations saved time and money and significantly minimized risks.

The system successfully passed all the stability, resilience and security tests of the insurance companies. In 4 out of the 7 organizations that use the old VB6 system, the conversion process has already completed or started and it is estimated to be completed in the next year in all of them.

Thanks to the intuitive, rich and modern user interface users were moved to the new system in only a few days. "The new system provides users with rich user interfaces and fast performance for the operations they perform on a daily basis and of course to an easy, flexible access to the system without the need for local installations." Director of Applications Division in a specialized Life Insurance Company.

Download PDF