Butler Cox Plc has published a report called Making Effective Use of Modern Development Tools: it concludes that in comparison with third generation languages, application development generators and fourth generation languages save time and effort spent on systems development; the report also forecasts that by end of this year, the number of software applications using modern development tools will rise by 30%, which means that 45% of applications development and maintenance within medium and large companies will use these tools; however, the report warns that the selection and introduction of tools must be approached with caution, otherwise there is a risk of overspending on training and support, and duplication of effort; the report also recommends a procedure for choosing and implementing the most appropriate development tools.
