Finding AS/400 technical documentation

["Dennis Lovelady" <dlovelady@xxxxxxxx>]

Hi, Folks:  I'll reserve my rant for after the question, but I'd sure like
to hear other opinions about it.  Hopefully, I just don't know where to
look, and all this stuff still is (and will remain) available.

My question is: where can I find documentation for the .TTO and .TFR files
used by file transfer?  I had a link to that information at one point, but
it's been invalidated by IBM "enhancements."  Would appreciate pointers to
that info.  Thanks.

And now my rant.  Maybe it's just me.  I hope so.

It seems that with each passing week, IBM makes useful documentation for
the AS/400 systems (particularly those that aren't labeled "iSeries") more
difficult to find.  Having found some documentation, it seems to be less
useful with each rework.

Used to be that the HTML-based "Book Manager" books could be found from the
main http://www.as400.ibm.com site (after clicking library).  Those
HTML-based books were wonderful because you could actually search the
specific manual for the information you wanted, and voila: you'd be
presented with links to the information you want.

That's all changed.  Or so it seems.  Now it's all packaged into the
"information center," where the most refined search one can perform, is a
search of the whole flippin' site.  Where the shortcomings of Java shine
through, substantiating the claim that a pretty interface is a useless
interface.  Given the choice, I'll take ugly ANY day of the week.

What IS the deal, IBM?  Do you not want people to understand how to
continue using this system?  Or am I missing the boat completely?  Can
ANYONE show me a reason that the new java "Information Center," aside from
being cuter, is an improvement over the "Book Manager" format?