Java for beginners

[Guest.Visitor]

I am trying to determine what I need to do to set up JAVA. What I am trying to do is send an AS/400 flat file to the internet from a PC. I do not want to have to FTP the file down each time. I believe the best way to do this is with JAVA. I know I have JAVA running on my AS/400. I believe I need to get JDBC and the Java Development Kit set up on the PC. If this is the best approach to handle what I am trying to accomplish, how do I install JDBC & the JDK on the PC. I searched the internet but could not find any downloads. Any advise would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. Ron

[Guest.Visitor]

Ron: please keep us posted; severarl respondents are interested in this as well...

[Guest.Visitor]

Sure will.

[J.Pluta]

I am trying to determine what I need to do to set up JAVA. What I am trying to do is send an AS/400 flat file to the internet from a PC. I do not want to have to FTP the file down each time. I believe the best way to do this is with JAVA. I know I have JAVA running on my AS/400. I believe I need to get JDBC and the Java Development Kit set up on the PC. If this is the best approach to handle what I am trying to accomplish, how do I install JDBC & the JDK on the PC. I searched the internet but could not find any downloads. Any advise would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. Actually, short of FTP or Client Access, the easiest way to download a file is using the IBM Java Toolbox for the AS/400. I have a web page that shows all the steps needed to download and install the JDK and the toolkit; in fact, Bob just got done using it. You can find it at the following URL: http://www.zappie.net/java/javatorium/installi.htm In fact, the last step is to install a program that reads a single record from a file. You could use that as a starting point for retrieving your flat file from the AS/400. If you decide to give it a try, let me know if you need any help. src="//www.zappie.net/java/_derived/index.htm_cmp_zero110_vbtn_p.gif" width="140" height="60" border="0" alt="Java400.net - Java/400 Freeware" align="middle"> Java400.Net - where the AS/400 speaks Java with an RPG accent Home of PBD2.0, the color=red>FREE Java/400 Client/Server color=blue>Revitalization Toolkit

[Guest.Visitor]

Hi Ron, Let me say first that, if you just need to grab the file with no edits or modifications, FTP may be a superior solution to java ( or any other language. ) As always, depends on your situation and exactly what you want to do. As to java: Whenever you need java development software and runtimes, the first place you should go to is http://www.javasoft.com This is java's home and there are also many other resources and links there. Although Joe's directions should be adequate to get you started on 1.1, the download and instructions are at: http://www.javasoft.com/products/jdk/1.1/index.html http://www.javasoft.com/products/jdk...win32-x86.html For whatever reason, the installation instructions are not included in the download. IBM also has a well received version of 1.1.8, available at: http://www.ibm.com/java/jdk/118/index.html http://www.ibm.com/java/jdk/118/installation.html Java 1.2 has been out for over a year and a half now and includes Swing and many improvements. You may prefer to get that at: http://www.javasoft.com/products/jdk/1.2/index.html http://www.javasoft.com/products/jdk...l-windows.html With 1.2 you no longer need to have java/jre.exe in your path, nor do you need the core java classes in your CLASSPATH. You'll still need CLASSPATH ( or sent as an argument ) for third party classes or your own when they reside in other directories, although you can use the extension mechanism ( carefully ) to obviate CLASSPATH entries. 1.3 is still early access, but is at Release Candidate 2 a/o this date. You do not need java on the 400 to access data, although you're often better off doing it that way. However, if java is loaded ( and current, ) you can get the Toolbox from your own 400. It resides in the /QIBM/ProdData/HTTP/Public/jt400/lib directory. Look for jt400.zip or jt400.jar. The latest versions and documentation are always on-line at: http://www.as400.ibm.com/toolbox/downloads.htm and portions of the Toolbox have gone open source. Best, Joe Sam Joe Sam Shirah Autumn Software Consulting/Development/Outsourcing Please Note New Email: jshirah@attglobal.net Visit our User Group at: http://www.jax400.com

[J.Pluta]

Java 1.2 has been out for over a year and a half now and includes Swing and many improvements. You may prefer to get that at: My only caveat with using Java 2 (Sun's name for JDK release 1.2) is that it might not be compatible with your AS/400 release. V4R3 is at version 1.1.7 of the JVM; this is binary compatible with 1.1.8, so I use 1.1.8 whenever I teach. Visual Age for Java version 2 doesn't support Java 2, either. So, you might want to think things through before leaping into Java 2. Do you plan to run your classes on a pre-V4R4 AS/400? Are you going to use Visual Age for Java 2.0? If either of those are "yes", stick with JDK1.1.8 and Swing for now, since the syntax is 100% upward compatible with Java 2. The only thing you really lose is the collections classes, and for beginning Java they're not that essential. And once V4R4 and VAJ3.0 become prevalent, I'll switch to Java 2, or maybe even release 1.3 (1.3 is first and foremost a performance release, so compatibility should be pretty high). src="//www.zappie.net/java/_derived/index.htm_cmp_zero110_vbtn_p.gif" width="140" height="60" border="0" alt="Java400.net - Java/400 Freeware" align="middle"> Java400.Net - where the AS/400 speaks Java with an RPG accent Home of PBD2.0, the color=red>FREE Java/400 Client/Server color=blue>Revitalization Toolkit

[Guest.Visitor]

Joe and Joe, Thanks for the response. I believe I do want to use Java instead of FTP, unless you know of a reason not to. Basically, I want to send raw EDI data (flat file, via the internet. Propably as an E-mail for now. I have downloaded the JDK-1_1_8_003 and the IBM Toolbox file. The zappiw web site mentions Swing 1.1. Do I need to download that as well? Ron

[Guest.Visitor]

Hi Ron, You might as well download it, although whether you'll need it or not depends on what you plan to do for a user interface. Swing is another name for the Java Foundation Classes ( JFC, ) which is a pure java, 99+% lightweight GUI toolkit. "Lightweight" here means that the vast majority of the code has no dependency on the native windowing kit. The AWT, which was/is the original GUI mapped directly to native widgets/components ( termed "heavyweight." ) Incidentally, assuming that an SMTP server is available on the 400 or locally off the LAN, which sounds like it is this case, you could actually do everything programmatically off the 400, using JavaMail or other SMTP client tools around. Oh, and my friends call me: Joe Sam

[J.Pluta]

Joe Sam told you everything you need to know about Swing: it's a lightweight graphical user interface framework. It's not needed for your particular project, but you'll need it if you ever do any UI programming, or if you use any of my packages. src="//www.zappie.net/java/_derived/index.htm_cmp_zero110_vbtn_p.gif" width="140" height="60" border="0" alt="Java400.net - Java/400 Freeware" align="middle"> Java400.Net - where the AS/400 speaks Java with an RPG accent Home of PBD2.0, the color=red>FREE Java/400 Client/Server color=blue>Revitalization Toolkit

[S.Mildenberger]

We are using the SMTP server on the 400 to do exactly this. The 400 SMTP server forwards the mail to our Exchange server. A physical file containing the edi data is copy to a folder with CPYTOPCD and then sent as e-mail with SNDDST. For easy directions in setting up the SMTP server go here, they also have a sample program which works just like I described. http://www.bytware.com/freestuff.htm Scott Mildenberger