Re: Time to get serious

Jim,

As a graduate of Glen Oaks Community College (Associate of Applied Science 
in Business), with a daughter currently attending Southwestern Michigan 
College (alas, in Backstage Theater, with hopefully a second major in MRS 
- don't tell her I said that), I am somewhat familiar with that geography.
Glen Oaks, back in the very early 80's, offered two RPG II courses. 
Neither ever got to screens.

Personally I'd love all the classes to be RPG/IV, free form, etc.  Now, 
most of the packages out there still use RPG/400 though (as I wipe the 
speckle of vomit from the edge of my lips).  Thus there might be some 
debate on what would be a better service to the business community.  Stop 
teaching RPGII though.  Anyone still using that should be forced to 
contract at high prices.  Judging by the volume of email coming to this 
list, and the content, it seems that most of the RPGII is going overseas 
anyway.  Spend 1 hour on the cycle - but you don't need RPGII for that. 
The cycle is a great tool, but it's one of those "you can lead a horse to 
water but you can't make him drink" things.  Some will never adopt it.  It 
still needs some minimal coverage because of the default opening of files, 
etc.

1) What skills should students have upon completing the program?
a)  WDSC, and a passing familiarity with the green screen tools
b)  Basic problem solving skills.
  b-1)  When a compile fails, how do I resolve it?  How do I look up 
further information on the message id?
  b-2)  debugging
  b-3)  How do I display a joblog?  F10 for further information, etc.
  b-4)  %error, %status, Monitor, Program Status Data Structure
c)  structured programming techniques:  DO, FOR, SELECT, IF.
d)  chain, setll, read, some brief knowledge of the file information data 
structure.
e)  Claim that you will pick 5 op codes at random on a quiz.  They don't 
have to know the exact syntax, but how they work will be nice.  Encourage 
them to have at least a passing knowledge of them all, why they might be 
used, and at least know they can look them up if needed.
f)  Navigational knowledge of Infocenter

2) How much focus should be placed on RPG II and the cycle?  How much is 
it being used in your shop?
a)  Just enough cycle to know what it does in every program that doesn't 
have a NOMAIN.  Any a simple report example of using it.  Used very seldom 
here.

3) Should there be more emphasis on RPG IV and ILE?
Yes.  Even though many existing packages stick with RPG IV

4) How would you assess a recent graduates skills, aptitude?
First they have to pass this weird test that personnel gives.  Then, for a 
recent grad, a lot of it's gut.

5) How important are specific languages verses the ability to learn 
languages and understand the business processes?
Last two RPG hires did not know RPG.  One was a COBOL/400 person.  The 
other was a mechanical engineer.  But their dad was ok - so what the hey. 
Working out real great.

6) Any other thoughts?

Rob Berendt
-- 
Group Dekko Services, LLC
Dept 01.073
PO Box 2000
Dock 108
6928N 400E
Kendallville, IN 46755
http://www.dekko.com





"Jim Hawkins" <jim.hawkins@xxxxxxxxxxx> 
Sent by: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
03/01/2005 10:57 AM
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Subject
Time to get serious






Some of this discussion has migrated to the skills that recent graduates 
have.  Since I serve on the CIS curriculum advisory board for a local 
community college (in Southwest Michigan) ; let me ask a few questions.

Keeping in mind that this is a 2 year program meaning students are only 
going to get a limited amount of exposure to anything.  The core 
curriculum begins with a programming logic course (using Visual Basic to 
model the logic) and completes with a capstone Systems Analysis course. In 

the meantime students are taught RPG (primarily III with some exposure to 
II and IV but none to ILE, and all green screen).  In addition, students 
are taught COBOL, Java, database/SQL.  We have had discussion about the 
place of C, C++ and C#.  A key goal is that students be employable.  (I 
also have taught a course from time to time on OS/400).  Outside of the 
CIS curriculum students are required to have a basic (101) accounting 
course and a couple of basic business courses (and English, Math, etc.)

1) What skills should students have upon completing the program?
2) How much focus should be placed on RPG II and the cycle?  How much is 
it being used in your shop?
3) Should there be more emphasis on RPG IV and ILE?
4) How would you assess a recent graduates skills, aptitude?
5) How important are specific languages verses the ability to learn 
languages and understand the business processes?
6) Any other thoughts?

I will pass your feedback on to the whole committee.

Thanks in advance.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 Jim Hawkins
 IBM Certified Specialist AS/400 RPG IV Programmer 
 Iseries. Myseries.
 Programmer/Analyst
 Eimo Americas
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