Re: Web Front End Advice

Jon Paris wrote:

On 25-Feb-08, at 10:36 PM, Brad Stone wrote:

Maybe we just have different audiences.

I guess so Brad. As soon as I found the toolkits my immediate reaction was "why did I waste my time" with the APIs.

I'm on both sides of these opinions.

CGIDEV (and CGIDEV2) is an interesting example for this discussion. The storm that came out of IBM's handling of it -- IBM lawyers, open/closed/proprietary-source status, Mel Rothman's and then Giovanni Perotti's retirement and the rest -- has pretty much settled; but there was a lot of nervousness going around. At least, among those using CGIDEV/2 without understanding their internals, there was some stress.

For those who coded directly to the APIs and who weren't using CGIDEV...? There was little reason even to pay attention to the storm.

Toolkits are great resources. Yet, there is much to be said for spending time with the APIs themselves.

A toolkit or tool (WRKDBF? QUSRTOOLS and Y2K?) might disappear or break at any time. A licensed product with a maintenance /contract/, e.g., DBU or TAATOOLS, provides buffering; but the APIs always go straight back to IBM for support, fixes and documentation.

Whenever possible, I use the toolkits as learning resources and try to minimize any production use. Burying a tool in production code can leave a nasty surprise for some later developer. Learning and using the appropriate APIs in appropriate ways can make a significant difference for years after development is finished.

Tom Liotta