Re: Time to get serious -- MIDRANGE-L


On 01/03/2005, at 1:04 PM, Joe Pluta wrote:

In my mind, a programmer that doesn't know about RPG is by definition not particularly well rounded -- they in fact have a significant hole in their knowledge of programming.

Not true. RPG in all its dialects is a niche language. It's only claim to fame is in the IBM midrange world. Even where it exists on other platforms (mainframe, *nix, and PC) it is some flavour of RPG II and marginalised. The IBM midrange world is a vary small part of the IT environment and it is not surprising that people outside that world know little of it. Many people inside it don't know as much as they think they do.

There is no reason a modern computer science graduate should know RPG and even less reason they should know *of* RPG. It has no bearing on their most likely employment requirements.

It's kind of like saying COBOL is not a
major language.  You may not LIKE the language, but to dismiss it says
more about you than the language.

COBOL is a major language. It has a presence on almost all platforms--and in a reasonably modern variant of the language too. It is also a major language because it has an independent standards body over-seeing its development. It is reasonable that a CS graduate knows of COBOL even if they can't program the language. Even in our rather incestuous midrange environment COBOL is a major language. It has low penetration in North American midrange sites (5-10%) and to a much larger degree in European midrange sites (40-50%) although dropping favour because most commercial midrange packages are written in some dialect of RPG.

By any measure RPG is not a major language. It has significant presence only in IBM midrange sites and that number does not stack up against the presence of languages in other sites.

To cling to the idea the RPG is the best language, primarily because that's the one you know best, says more about you than the language. RPG II and III are fairly crappy programming languages for which the best feature is that they get the job done. Oh, and they can be written and understood by relatively unqualified personnel (which is a major reason why so much RPG code is so bloody awful--and that in turn is a major reason why the language is held in such disdain by devotees of other languages). RPG IV is reasonable language that is very good at what it does but it is no better at business oriented tasks than COBOL (or PL/1 for that matter). Oooh, but it's got CHAIN--be still my beating heart.

Regards,
Simon Coulter.
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