Re: CODE/400

** Reply to note from DAsmussen <DAsmussen@aol.com> Fri, 6 Mar 1998 19:24:44 EST

> C'mon Chris!  Managers at large corporations (and perhaps rightly so) don't
> GIVE A HOOT about the language used, and really like it when you can come up

Dean, they will sure care a lot when they try to get that Basic app
running on the AS/400 Dean. 

Again, you skip the point that Code is for AS/400 shops.

> with a C/S application, which CODE _won't_ do.  Small shops probably aren't

Wrong. You can license the VA RPG piece (which happens to be part of the $
figure being bandied about) and your RPG guys are cutting and pasting
objects together into PC based applications, either standalone or
accessing AS/400 data. 

Dean, your argument lacks substance. The product, Code/400 provides a way
to develop for AS/400s. VB does not. If you own an AS/400 and want to
develop code on it, Visual Basic is not even an option. 

What happens here is you are applying faulty logic. Simply because
Code/400 can do what VB can do (ie. build PC apps) you treat it like VB
can do what Code/400 can do. This is defective logic.


> going to buy CODE _or_ VB.  Large ones care about increasing productivity,
> period -- language be damned.  We've got a VB application right now that was

Odds are they will choose a language that actually works on the computers
they are running. 

Dean, do you suppose that businesses all through the US would switch to
publishing all their documents in Chinese if Chinese word processors were
cheaper? Or would they take into account that not all of their target
audience knows Chinese?

> written merely because RPG wouldn't access the data on an SQL-Server Box, a
> Tandem, and the AS/400 in real-time fashion.  Yeah, we could have FTP'd the
> whole thing to the AS/400 (and it would have run faster), but the Tandem
> didn't have TCP/IP installed and data propagation wouldn't have happened in
> real time.  All these managers see is that _GOOD_ RPG programmers are hard to
> come by, and pricey.

Here you are refering to RPG that runs on the AS/400. Again, this is the
code that the VB product will not generate. The PC based program, written
in VB, could have been created in RPG with VA RPG, part of the Code/400
product. So, if you had researched the potential, you could have licensed
Code/400 and had a tool that allowed you to both build PC side
applications AND increase productivity of RPG programmers (thus reducing
the actual cost of RPG coding).

> Not if it's not a cross-platform language.  The other reason is that VB
> personnel = easy to come by, cheap; RPG people = hard to come by, expensive.
> What did you mean by "chiseled in stone"?

Chiseled in stone. ie, you still use cave-man tools to do RPG. If IBM
hadn't dropped it, you'd still be using POP. 

And just how "cross platform" is VB?

> >  "Devil's advocate"? You were stating that IBM would be better off to lower
> >  the price of their software so it would be more popular with thieves! 
>   
> Sighhhh.  If you say so.

Please review your posts. 

> I'm only upset with the CASE tool because it hasn't been improved other than
> to fix things that were broken (and there wasn't MUCH broken) for the past
> four years.  The newest version, released late 4Q97, fixes a Y2K issue with
> the built-in date functions.  The tool was supposed to have been replaced with
> a new GUI version over two _YEARS_ ago!  So nothing new -- "it'll be in the
> (perpetually promised, yet to materialize) GUI version".  You'll excuse me if
> I disregard the "anecdotal evidence" of your "poll".

I see. So your position is A: Since the Case tool you use has not been
upgraded as expected two years ago it isn't as good as SEU (um, when was
that last big boost in SEU?) and B: Although you experience and my
experience both show that AS/400 are highly resistant to adopting any new
development methods, we have not managed to gain a market sample and all
the shops we haven't seen are out their refusing to buy Code/400 because
Visual Basic is cheaper.

Does that sum it up?

> >  Then what exactly were you saying or implying when you indicated that IBM
> >  should lower the price of Code/400 (an RPG development tool for the
> >  AS/400) to be more comparable with Visual Basic (a graphic cut and paste
> >  application builder for Basic on a PC)?
>   
> Because, again, management doesn't _CARE_ about the language.  All they care
> about is personnel availability and price.  I agree with Jon's plan to make
> CODE more modular, just like VB.

Why is this so difficult to understand, Dean? The RPG programmers ARE
programming in RPG. There is no connection between that and Visual Basic. 

You keep running round and round with a bunch of bull about price of VB
and VB programmers being cheaper and whatnot. What the heck does that have
to do with it?

If you have an RPG programmer, and she is writing RPG code, then a tool to
make that go faster is Code/400. Buying her Visual Basic, new shoes, a
copy of War and Peace, an instruction manual for assembling a swing set, a
new universal remote, and/or ACME Fake Vomit (now with Corn!) will not
affect the rate of RPG production. 

If the shop does not have an RPG programmer that they would like to have
be able to work faster, then Code/400 doesn't seem to make much sense. 

The point is, Code/400 helps RPG programmers work faster. The product will
more than pay for itself. 

This has nothing to do with deciding what language to develop in! This has
nothing to do with what platform to develop on! This has nothing to do
with comparing client based processing to host based processing to client
server processing to network processing. 

This has to do with those shops that, for WHATEVER reason, have decided to
employ people writing RPG code. If these particular shops are spending
$60,000 annually to keep an RPG programmer in place writing code, then
Code/400 can help them to get increased results for their money.

> >  However, it appears that your client has opted for reading Visual Basic
> >  ads and wishing desperately he could hire more people to increase
> >  productivity?
>   
> Now wait just a darn minute!  Weren't _YOU_ the one that argued vehemently
> with me about the fact that management _didn't_ make decisions based solely
> upon advertising?  I apologize in advance if you weren't.  The client uses VB

I certainly am Dean! I didn't say that I believed what you said, I just
reiterated it. Recall that you were quoting me a story of a shop that
could not use Code/400 (and I have no idea why, since it is Code/400 we
were discussing) and telling me that they could have a VB programmer in
the shop immediately. 

> Last I heard, JAVA Enterprise came free with V4R2.  Is that not the case?

One license. I guess so shops can steal the rest, eh?

> Then why haven't you published those figures here, instead of continuing to
> "flog the dead horse" that this thread has become?  If anyone even remembers,
> it started as a valid request by Jon Paris for valid options to be considered
> by IBM to make CODE/400 more marketable.  I think that the former is
> desirable, and that _this_ line of commentary has become counter-productive.

Dean, you must have missed several of my posts.

> And _you_ continue to ignore the fact that there are languages other than RPG
> that are valid for use on the AS/400 -- even if they are developed on another
> platform.  The differentiation (a word?) between the tasks narrows more and
> more every day.  As I stated earlier, an "AS/400 application developer" may
> soon be something needed only by those same accounts that refuse to give up
> their /36's today...

I know you are aware that Visual Basic applications do not run on the
AS/400. The above paragraph makes it seem as though you think they do.

> Dean Asmussen
 

Chris Rehm
Mr.AS400@ibm.net

How often can you afford to be unexpectedly out of business?
Get an AS/400.
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