Re: DDS Support

James,

At 6/30/00 01:36 AM -0700, you wrote:

Well, actually, not running, I am sort of trotting, maybe briskly
walking, into SQL and JAVA. ;) It's the whole print thing and stuff like
level breaks that are holding me back. I still have a lot of RPG/CL/DDS
clients to support, but I am given liberty (without budget) to try out
different approaches.

 Then you're luckier than many us!  I'm all for practical, forward change.  I'm against change for the sake of change, especially one that doesn't fully replace the functionality of what we already have. 

 A positive example of change would be RPG IV.  It provides all the functionality of RPG/400 and a whole lot more.  IBM also provided a simple, but functional conversion utility.

 A negative example of change would be the discontinuance of OV/400 (with all its warts).  The stated migration path is Notes, which doesn't have all the functionality of OV/400 and there doesn't seem to be a migration utility yet (correct me if I'm wrong) to make the migration easier.

 IMHO, the SQL falls mostly into the latter category.

Maybe when I get up to speed on SQL I'll have a better appreciation for
the "missing" parts you mention.  But, again, I stand by the premise
that if you have your own tool for data definition, you can control the
creation of DDS or SQL (of any flavor or limitation) and not have to
worry or care about if IBM makes enhancements to DDS, which I think is
what started this discussion.

 You seem to be assuming that all / most shops have some sort of code generator to do the work for them.  In my experience this is not the case. 

Personally I could care less about -how- I must define a file, my issue
is whether I can automate the process.  With the proper tools, you can
become platform or implementation independent.  IMHO, DDS is just a
particular platform, and from what you tell me, IBM's SQL is just a
particular implementation.

 My contention is that the hard work has already been done by the DB2 folks.  Putting the additional functionality into DDS should be relatively trivial.

Maybe my view point was slanted by my
first mentor that made a simple, yet profound (to me anyway) statement:
"Programs -are- data."  For a compiler writer a source program is the
input, for a tool writer the program is the output.  The same can be
said for DDS or SQL or IDDU or whatever the world throws at us next.

 So you're putting the burden on the tool writers??   I don't that's fair either, but as I mentioned above, most shops don't seem have these tools anyway.

 BTW, while the quote you mentioned is an interesting view of programs, it must be anecdotal, since the common usage of programs does not fall into the description of "Programs -are- data."

 -mark