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I quote no-one in particular but respond to this post in general........I have been reading this thread (or should we say ROPE both because it is so thick and because many seem to be attempting use it to hang themselves) with considerable interest and would like to point out what I think I see.
1) Many say Green Screen is better than GUI.I have in fact made this statement a time or two and sometimes it is true. However the generalizations made here are often just silly. A badly written green screen sucks. (Try using JDA for a day, AAAARRRGGGHHH!!!!! There I got that out. ) A badly written GUI sucks GUIly. Even when something works as expected it can still be stupid. e.g. A pop up box comes up with only one button and the button is labeled "OK", it has focus and pressing ENTER or space bar will take the OK action. However the text says "A Severe Irreversible Unrecoverable Terminal Error has occurred." This is most certainly *NOT* OK!!
2) Many say GUI is better than Green Screen.I have in fact made this statement a time or two and sometimes it too is true. Again generalizations of this are also wrong. Depending on what you are doing *BOTH* may be wrong. When we check books out at the local library there is an interface that the librarians use. I have no clue if it's green or GUI but they do this: Scan the bar code on the library card. Scan the bar code on each book. Say :"Have a nice day." It takes usually between 10 and 15 seconds total unless my bookworm daughter is there in which case it takes 30 seconds because of all the books!
So what does all this have to do with System i? Only that System i applications STEREOTYPICALLY have green screen interfaces. STEREOTYPICALLY these are considered bad. So we got a bad thing attached to us so we are bad. Well, let's break that!!
We can spend our energy whining about a name change or the color of our interfaces rather let's spend it on helping each other do the BEST for the problem at hand! Sure we'll have to fix problems along the way but even Thomas Edison said: "even if he had tried 500 or 1000 different variations on an experiment and not one had worked, then he had learned 500 or 1000 ways not to proceed with the experiment."
So let's fail along the way a few times but let's learn and share what WORKS instead of carping about change. Use the tools we have to make everything we have even better than it is. Not change for changes sake but change for the better!
I wish that all the energy that has been pushed in this thread about GUE and GREEN and whathaveyou would be focused on what System i does not just OK, not just Good, or even Great, but best, THE BEST.
The worlds best database. Built in, not on.The only database that boasts BOTH a native AND the most SQL compliance of anyone. The only database that is SO self managing that users ignore the h--k out of it yet it just runs. The only machine that is so resistant to viruses that so far as we know it has never had one. Not just today, EVER. The only machine with such solid security that properly set up, it's virtually impossible to break in. The only machine that doesn't Sometimes runs multiple applicaionts, rather it nearly ALWAYS runs multiple applications and does so solidly. The machine that scales THIRTY THOUSAND percent with EXACTLY the same operating system.
The only truly 64 bit object oriented machine top to bottom.The machine that allows expansion of RAID sets, Dis k pools, HSL loops, Towers all ON THE FLY! The machine that supports more operating environments than Elizabeth Taylor has had names.
Now this may sound like preaching to the choir here, but man, the choir I'm hearing needs some serious preachin!!
Permit me a small diversion: "I'm old, and I'm ANGRY!In my day we didn't have PCs. PCs were considered EVIL! If you got a PC people would talk about you, and the other developers would have a meeting about you! Them PCs had Color, and screens with more than 80 characters, and some had pictures on them! In my day we had Terminals. We had green screens and twinax. We'd holler at them people in engineerin and graphics desine: HEY! WHAT's THAT THING WITH THE TAIL IN YER HAND YA OLD BAT!" <ha ha ha> LEAVIN CHEESE ON YER DESK AGAIN YA DIRTY BUGGER! <he he he> That's the way it was. AND WE LIKED IT!
In my day we didn't let the users tell us what they needed! In my day we gave them programs and told them to use them. If it didn't do what they wanted they could fill our forms requesting changes. And we would lose them and do what we wanted. That's the way it was. AND WE LIKED IT!
In my day, we didn't let users download stuff. We kept everything inside the server. It was our data and we controlled it. Besides we had undecipherable codes in there and MMDDYY dates with century offsets and other stuff they wouldn't understand. Besides, downloading stuff would just make it too available and it would just be misunderstood. Users can't be trusted with data. That's the way it was. AND WE LIKED IT!
In my day we did backups at lunch! We took the system when WE needed it. It was ours after all, and we deserved evenings and weekends at home too! That's the way it was. AND WE LIKED IT!
In my day, we didn't do security. Security wasn't needed. Nothing was connected and we restricted people to menus. The menus were limited by the application. That's the way it was. AND WE LIKED IT!
In my day, we didn't have networks. Networks just gave us problems because everyone could connect. That would cause us to have to do real security. And besides the users would get to the data. That's the way it was. AND WE LIKED IT!
In my day we didn't have no ILE. We wrote mainlines 2000 lines long. In RPGII. With I specs and O specs. We didn't need no DDS or journals or referential integrated um triggers or none of that stuff! And we did direct printer I/O too. No spooling, that just go in the way! That's the way it was. AND WE LIKED IT!
In my day we didn't have WDSc! We had the Programmer Menu and SEU. And it edited one line at a time. As it SHOULD BE! We didn't need debuggin either, our code was good! We didn't use change management, we compiled right into production and wore our sox on our feet!
In my day we didn't have bar codes, or data collection, or uploads, or web services. If data was valuable it got keyed so we could edit it! We knew it was right because our edits were smarter than the users. That's the way it was. AND WE LIKED IT, WE LOVED IT!"
- Larry
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