VB Future ? & Visual Age RPG

 >> Im really interested is Visual Age RPG any good

I like it - along with procedure support it put the fun back in RPG
programming for me.

 >> So far I cant get a answer as to whether this will work on the desktop
without being connected to the AS/400.

You can use the product stand-alone, to develop windows-based apps but
that's not really its design point.  It does however have the ability to
handle local files in three ways.  1) Program described flat files
(sequential and RRN) 2) SQL access to a DB/2 data source 3) using ODBC -
this last option is not very smoothly integrated in the current release but
I suspect it will get better.  Of course you can also call directly to any
other program/DLL/API on the PC that provides data access.

 >> PS: there is only one book available on Visual Age RPG - a
disappointing slim
expensive volume and there does not appear to be the support out there
about this product.

I don't know why you say disappointing, I thought the book was quite good
myself. Agreed it would be nice if there were more books and hopefully this
will change in the future, but the standard docs that come with the product
include a tutorial and there are samples etc. on the web site.  I also
suggest you check out the Visual RPG forum on the News400 site.

 >> You also have to buy software for the AS/400 when you purchase Visual
Age .....

There is only one requirement for the AS/400 and that is that it has ADTS.
Since most (all ?) development sites have this anyway for PDM, SEU, SDA,
etc. Its not normally a problem.  If you don't already have this, how are
you currently doing your AS/400 development ?


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