You made a good point about designing in the visual tool and then refining in QA. That's exactly what I'd like to do in EM only the capability is lacking for joins. That is the part that I can't figure out. Access is exceptional in this area. Same company, differing quality in product...

As for Zloof, here's the conclusion from my paper:

Dr. Zloof pioneered the research for visual user interfaces in data base languages in the 1970’s by developing QBE. QBE has been incorporated into many software products since then (i.e., Microsoft Access). Also, QBE has become the basis for all other research in the area of visual query languages. QBE and OBE has lead Dr. Zloof to research and develop IC-BY-EXAMPLE, “a new paradigm to enable non-programmer professional to construct their own applications”.

All the best,

Dale