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On Fri, 24 May 2002, Heeter, Kathleen wrote:

> Good Afternoon;
>
> We are implementing a new software package on our branch pc's.
> This software will create text files of orders to be sent to the as/400. One
> file will be created per order. Pxxxmmddyyhhmmss is the naming convention of
> each individual file. We need to come up with the best way to automatically
> get these files to the 400 without user (salesperson) intervention.

The "best" way would entirely depend on your criteria.  Are you the one
writing the PC software?  Do you have control over how it works?

> We need to confirm to them that we received the file. We need to provide
> a way for them to resend the files to us at corporate if they were not
> received properly.

How will you know if they were received "properly"?

> Is there some job I can create on the PC's to say if P*.* shows up
> in c:\directoryname, trigger job to send it to the 400? Then FTP the file?
> Is that the best way? If so, do you know of a way to show them we received
> the file....

When the PC program opens the disk file, it will show up as a file in the
directory.  You could write a program that would monitor for the
existance of the file in that directory.   But, wow will you know when the
PC program is actually "done" with that file?  When the file is opened,
it shows up, then the PC program writes data to it, then it closes it.
How will you know that you aren't getting it in the middle of the
"writing data" step?  Are you planning to base that on whether the file is
locked by the operating system?   Do you know if the program will ever
release the lock and request it again, or open the file more than once?

Assuming you can get past that, then you could FTP it to the AS/400.  At
the end of the FTP, you could call an AS/400 program to process the file.
But, how will you know that everything went well during the file transfer?
How will you verify things?

>
> So many questions..... Can you help? Please and thank-you tons!!!!
>

If I were the one writing the PC software, I guess I'd have it be in
constant communications with the AS/400.  An AS/400 program specifically
designed to talk to it would handle the remote end.   They'd work together
to transfer the data and send messages confirming things so that there'd
never be a situation where the file had to be "re-sent".

But, if you don't have control over the PC side, and you MUST store the
file on the PC, I'd still write custom software.   It would be more
complicated to figure out when the PC is done with the file, but at least
you'd be able to communicate with the AS/400 in ways that FTP can't.
You'd be able to see exactly where errors are happening, unlike the FTP
scripts commonly used for these things, and you'd be able to signal things
like re-sends and completion info that FTP cannot do.

However, FTP may be the easiest/cheapest way to go about this.

So, again, I have to say that what is "best" really depends on your
criteria.





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