Lowest common denominator (was: RE: RPGMail Wrapping)

> I am curious, how many other programmer's besides Joe here are stuck in
> a shop where they only allow you to code to the lowest denominator?
> It's a battle that I have fought several times before.

I'm the IT manager here, so I don't have many battles.  :)

> I believe it is part of our _job_ to continue to learn the best way to
> code for the job at hand.  RPGIV is a must - let RPGII die.

That's absolutely the way I feel about it.  In the computer industry,
technology changes and improves.  That's a fact.   If you're not willing
to change at all, then you need to seriously think about changing
professions.

> Of course, that won't happen until the big ERP vendors allow it to (see
> JDE). Funny that most people still consider RPGIV the "new style" when
> it's been available for over a decade now!

Maybe someone should put out a competing product that uses the new
methods, and therefore has all of the benefits of doing so.   Since the
new methods make it easier to develop, you can sell the software for less,
and because of the nicer user interfaces and more powerful features,
you'll have a better product.

> There is a time and a place for everything "new" that RPGIV has to offer
> - sub-procedures, service programs, /free, nested data structures, etc.

Yes, I find it absolutely incredible that people can still live with
RPGIII (and by that, I also mean RPG/400).   Even 10 years or so ago, when
I did not have RPG IV as an option, I felt stifled by the limitations of
RPGIII.  Every day I said things like "Every other language has variable
length strings, why doesn't this one?"  and "Every other language has
modular capabilities" and "No other language makes me code with 6
character variables".

Even before RPG IV came out, and that was a long time ago, RPG III was
already way behind the rest of the world.   Just about everything that's
"new" about RPG IV has been around in other languages for 30 years.

To me, it's completely absurd that people are still using RPG/400.

> Unfortunately, I think that the majority of iSeries RPG programmers
> agree that we need to code so that others will be able to understand it.
> Why not code in a way that will allow the lowest denominators to learn
> something and allow them to grow their own skill set?

It's absolutely true that we need to code so that other people will be
able to understand it.   That is perhaps the most important thing you do
when writing code!  It's vital that other people will be able to figure
out your code.

That does not mean that you shouldn't use new features, however!

Let's take an extreme analogy...   if my 3 month old nephew can't
talk, does that mean that talking is too complicated and we should all go
back to "goo-goo" "ga-ga" sounds? No.  In time, with effort, my nephew
will learn to talk.  He will be better for it.

And the same is true in programming.   If I use a new feature, and my code
is clean and easy to follow, another programmer may have to spend some
time in the books seeing what's going on.   But, he'll be better for it
when he's done.

And, it's a lot easier for him to learn the new method when he's got a
fully functional example to look at.   You've done him a great service by
writing your code with new features in it.

> I realize that I'm most likely preaching to the choir here on this
> list...  Am I?

Definitely.