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IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

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  • #31
    IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

    Back in 2000 I went to Common in Minneapolis. I sat in the RPG class when the instructor (cannot remember his name) said "Look around at the hundreds of people in this class. RPG is not dead." I have not attended Common or IBM conferences since then. Has anyone noticed a decrease in attendance at the conferences? I have to believe the numbers are dwindling. Just my opinion though.

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    • #32
      IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

      The whole PC-Explosion was based on perceived "ease", "empowerment" by folks who thought they knew a lot about computing and who shoved IT or IS out of the decision loop. IBM -response: nil

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      • #33
        IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

        Hi John, Thanks for the details on your support and app structure. Have you ever looked into .NET for development on the iSeries ? With ASNA's product you don't have to learn Java - they have a fully compatible and fully functional Visual RPG product that functions inside .NET and it provides all the GUI and Windows development features you'd need. mollykj

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        • #34
          IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

          I just wanted to add that this product can also be used to create web applications as well as windows applications. And the data can come from the iSeries or from an SQL server. It is very functional and we have been using it for years! It allows us to create GUI products for windows and the web, using good old RPG. Tony

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          • #35
            IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

            ASNA's product can also set up a DB2/400 database on a pc. And the programs can connect to multiple databases.

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            • #36
              IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

              Just to be clear, it's their DB2/400 clone database product which runs on Windows. You can develop a native I/O (and embedded SQL?) against an iseries~AS/400 and sell to a customer to run on Windows server, or develop against a Windows server with their database and sell to an iseries customer, or sell to both. Apps developed against other databases would be written using SQL I/O, and of course some variation of the SQL would also run against DB2/400 (and their DB2/400 clone database?), as well as other databases you developed for. Client can be thin Windows program with no business logic, thick client/server Windows with RPG and native I/O running against DB2/400 and/or their clone on Windows, SQL against them and others, or all logic on a Windows server serving web pages with data from databases on same or other Windows servers and/or iseries. While the .NET RPG code doesn't run on iseries, you can in an iseries environment make liberal use of calls to iseries running as much in programs on the iseries as you want, for example current production enterprise software. That would be custom development for that iseries customer and would be limited to running against that iseries. I haven't developed in it, but I tried to nurture it as one of our development platforms for one large company I worked for. The ASNA people are very sharp. rd

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              • #37
                IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                Um... why do this when you have Visual Age for RPG freely available? It comes as part of the WDSC product, and allows you to write event-driven RPG code that connects to DB2 on the host. Joe

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                • #38
                  IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                  It depends on the show you go to. The LUG shows here in the midwest (WMCPA, Omni) grow every year. Omni is adding a second day with half-day lab sessions. I'm not sure about the IBM conferences, but I hear no word that they're getting smaller. iSeries DevCon grows every year, and the show is fantastic. Vegas in November is a nice time of year, as well. COMMON may be dwindling, but it's not because of the iSeries community. Joe

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                  • #39
                    IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                    For software vendors, Joe, the additional Windows market is compelling. For an iseries corporate environment like I was in, Visual Age could have competed head to head with ASNA. This was before Wdsc, and the competition was based on quality of product, not tie-ins to Websphere. I recall one good thing we considered about the Visual Age product line (not sure which piece exactly, but I think for RPG) was its ability to generate Java code from RPG. We were thinking about that if we went to Java. My recollection was that ASNA leveraged existing code much better. We evaluated many, many migration paths, it was unbelievable. IBM's Visual Age for RPG didn't make it any further for serious evaluation, but I can't recall what was considered its biggest stumbling block. I didn't evaluate it personally, it was eliminated before it got to me. Thanks for pointing that out. I remember hearing that IBM bundled it with Wdsc a few years ago. Maybe someone can comment on Visual Age for RPG in Wdsc. I can't recall too much said about it one way or another. rd

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                    • #40
                      IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                      We developed a few of our applications with ASNA's Visual RPG and then our bosses wanted me to develop a new application with Visual Age for RPG because it is free. Things were just fine until I needed to do something that I couldn't figure out. There was nothing in the only book we could find for Visual Age for RPG and we couldn't get any help from IBM (i.e. nobody we asked ever returned an answer). Since we really needed whatever feature I couldn't produce with Visual Age, our bosses permitted me to rewrite the entire system with ASNA's Visual RPG. (They were pleasantly surprised at how fast that went.) Note: Someone from IBM did send me an e-mail about eight months after I asked for help with Visual Age for RPG. I think they finally found the group that supports the product. I did like Visual Age for RPG but it was so limited and the technical support for ASNA's Visual RPG both at ASNA and elsewhere is much better.

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                      • #41
                        IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                        You are all wrong. In answer to the question 'What will it take to turn the System i around?' nearly every entry discusses iSeries, i5/OS, RPG, GUIs and ASNA. - System i is a great platform that runs multiple, concurrent instances of four operating systems in a reliable, manageable way. - i5/OS is a great operating system and one of those four. It is an environment both for business and infrastructure applications. - RPG is a programming language. I don't know a lot about it but in the world of SOA it shouldn't need a great user interface to be a valuable component of a business application. Until we and IBM can understand these differences then there is no hope for the platform. When we do, it will be seen as the world-beater that I believe it to be.

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                        • #42
                          IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                          I have decided to take a different approach to the question "What will it take to turn the System i around?" Today's boxes are far smaller and lighter than those of a generation ago. In most cases it should only take one individual to pick up the box and move it 180 degrees. Dave

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                          • #43
                            IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                            Dear John, You got it right the Systemi is great platform running multiple, concurrent instances of 4 operating systems in a reliable & managable way. You got it wrong that we're wrong. We're not. As technical people, we see the gaps in our toolset of what we need to meet the demands from our user-community, so we talk about that. Then the comments about the pitifully poor - even brain dead marketing - IBM has been doing for the system pinpoints another real problem. Why IBM doesn't choose to market this system aggressively is anyone's guess - because we KNOW if they did, it would be successful. So your suggestion on a third approach - that we take this discussion out of the traditional technical arena to a different perspective on the system altogether - is another example of the creative, flexible, and innovative people out there who know the System i and that IBM should be listening to (us). Maybe IBM thinking about all three of these "gripe" areas could shake loose a few brain cells there and we'd finally begin to see some changes ! I always try to be an optimist.

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                            • #44
                              IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                              Since every one of your comments on these forums has been a sales pitch for ASNA and you don't actually say who you are, I have to assume you work for ASNA or an affiliate. That being the case, I insist that you identify: A. When this problem occurred. B. The feature you couldn't find in VARPG. C. The person(s) you talked to at IBM. If you choose not to respond the readers can judge for themselves the integrity of your statement, and by association, of the product. Joe

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                              • #45
                                IMHO: What Will It Take to Turn the System i Around?

                                Then the comments about the pitifully poor - even brain dead marketing - IBM has been doing for the system pinpoints another real problem. Why IBM doesn't choose to market this system aggressively is anyone's guess - because we KNOW if they did, it would be successful.
                                Success depends on point of view. The machine must be meeting IBM's business objectives. I agree the marketing strategy is incomprehensible. The base is not growing, and while the rest of the world tries to wring every last drop of performance out of their machines IBM works to throttle down performance to a fraction of the machines' true power. And this to support various market segments. Segments that exist in their imagination. The hardware behind i & p series is essentially the same. The i series is a marketing program. But it's not 1987 anymore and marketing programs do not exist in a vacuum. CUD is today's version the famous "golden screwdriver" of legend. "I" is a great box assembled by a great team. Strip off the govenors and let 'er rip. And sell it. Hard. Today. If you aren't already a customer and by some miracle decide upon an i series, you'll have to research how to buy one. Where to go. Who to talk to. Can you see one in action? Maybe. So you have an unfamiliar machine, with limited visibility, unknown and complex purchasing methods, and with a shrinking base. So in my opinion, the marketing program called "i" is not making it in the broader marketplace. And that's a shame. But it must be meeting IBM's business objectvies, whatever they are. I can only surmise that it's viewed as a success. What else can I think? To be charitable, "it has some challenges and opportunities". Raw reality: send an SOS we're taking on water! Just my opinion and everyone's got one of those. Tom D.

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