Re: Platform Independence (was George is Farr from where we want tobe)

[Pete Helgren <Pete@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Yep.  From that perspective (which I'll admit I haven't had for a while) 
an approach the "pushes" developers into another language and toolset in 
order to get a "modern look and feel" (GUI) doesn't make much sense.  
Leveraging the current skill set and tools seems more pragmatic.  Thanks 
for bringing that to my attention, as obvious as it is!

Perhaps Jon Paris' post about the evolution of the tools though the 
Rational "juggernaut" IS to blame.  With the focus changing from how to 
make developers more productive on the platform and having platform 
zealots develop those tools to an approach that focuses on justifying an 
acquisition expense and retrofitting the tools onto the System i 
platform, perhaps the battle is already lost. (my paraphrase of Jon's post).

Pete


albartell wrote:
> You make a lot of good points Pete, and from what I can see we are both on
> the same page.  You, as a software reseller, want to write software in a
> language that wont cause you to lose sales because you had to sell a piece
> of expensive hardware to go with it.  I don't disagree with your approach
> and it is great that the iSeries supports things like Java and PHP for your
> purposes.
>
> Here's what I struggle with: There are die hard RPG programmers writing home
> grown applications for companies that have already chosen the iSeries as
> their platform of choice.  They understand, for the most part, why they dish
> out the many thousands of dollars a year.  They understand that they gain
> ROI by using the same technologies repeatedly (RPG, DSPF, PF's, CL, DB2,etc)
> year in and year out.  They have become very productive in meeting their
> business needs.  Now IBM comes and says: "We have a roadmap for you to get
> to GUI, and here it is.  You use these wizards and walla! You have GUI."
> Well, in the middle of that they introduced a whole bunch of things that I
> would consider far from being native.  They essentially took their tools
> normally used for cross platform purposes and tried to make them fit with
> intimate native practices.  True blue RPG shops don't want this (speaking
> mostly for myself but believe others share my sentiment).  They don't want
> to introduce another language.  They are not looking to migrate or run on
> Windows.  These are they people that aren't getting as much development time
> from IBM.
>
> Thanks for your comments Pete,
> Aaron Bartell
>   
>