Re: Lower End AS/400s -- MIDRANGE-L

On 17 Dec 2002 at 0:28, James W. Kilgore wrote:

[snip]
>
> As a 25+ year professional, I support quality, and IMHO, the
> AS/400-iSeries is as good as it gets.  My clients, the REAL survivors
> of ANY economy, also seek quality.  The acquisition of quality is WHY
> they are the survivors!
>

When I first started in what used to be called "DP", back mumblety-mumble years
ago, the prevailing wisdom was that the death-rattle was sounding in RPG's 
throat,
and that the micro would kill the midrange.

Well, here I am today writing apps in RPG, and writing clients in VB/C etc. to 
talk to
socket servers on my AS/400 (the prevailing wisdom department, as I recall,
delcared the 400 terminally ill about 10 years ago), and it all serves the 
business just
fine.

I should confess at this point.  I was singing the dirge right along with all 
the other
"wise" folks, for I was a server/array & *nix bigot.  I have seen the light...

I agree with James.  I think businesses tend to adopt what in their experience 
works,
and not deviate a heck of a lot from that.  Someone (apologies in advance, I 
forget
who) weighed in with the statement that he was running Linux servers with little
difficulty and 99%+ uptime.  So, how are you going to convince that person that 
he
should make a change away from something he knows that he can deploy in such a
way that it is stable and not disruptive to the business?

I think that the 400's incredible stability is due, at least in part, to the 
tight integration
between the hardware and the operating system.  This provides a degree of fault
tolerance and management that is, in my opinion, technically unequaled on any
comparable platform (including *nix).

That stability and performance, however, are also affected by proper 
configuration.
Whether its OS/400, *nix, or Windoze, if you have hardware that is not equal to 
the
load you place on it, you are going to experience instability and poor 
performance.

[snip]

>
> There are many participants on this list that would enjoy a truly
> lucid, logical, honest discussion of the merits of any technical,
> economical business solution that benefits both your career and those
> that employ you.
>
[snip]

I've been more successful writing 3 & 4 tiered apps on the iSeries than any 
other
platform.  I think that this is because of the high level of integration 
between the
database and the operating system, and the resultant increase in OS services
available to the programmer.

There are a lot of people here with a lot of technical knowledge and a 
willingness to
share it, including Joe and Konrad.  I agree with James, we'd all benefit by 
such a
discussion.  I have learned much lurking about here, and I feel much gratitude 
to the
people who participate in this list.

Remember, before you say anything bad about anybody, that you shoud walk a mile
in their shoes.  That way, if you still need to say something insulting, you're 
a mile
away and you've got their shoes....

[snip]

Happy holidays to all!

--Chris