Re: Calculating Cyclomatic Complexity of an RPG program

This topic about RPG program complexity roughly parallels a recent discussion on LinkedIn, where a Java programmer recommended the Spring framework. That led me to the following tutorial.

http://static.springsource.org/docs/Spring-MVC-step-by-step/index.html

My review of that Spring tutorial moved me to create an essentially identical application using HTML templates and RPG as follows:

http://www.radile.com/rdweb/ptl/ptl100/launch.shtml?app=invp100


The HTML templates:

http://www.radile.com/rdweb/temp/begin.html


The RPG source:

http://www.radile.com/rdweb/temp/invp100at.txt


If you take the time to review both implementations of this very simple application you will see how overwhelmingly complex the Spring implementation is compared to the RPG, but that would probably NOT be evident by calculating cyclomatic complexity.

You'll find "if", "do while", and "select ... when" blocks in the RPG code. You'll find "if", "for each", and "try ... catch" blocks in the Java code. But that's not where the mystery and complexity lie. What makes the Spring implementation so overwhelmingly complex?

-Nathan.


________________________________
From: Matt Olson <Matt.Olson@xxxxxxxx>
To: "midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx" <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, June 22, 2012 2:07 PM
Subject: Calculating Cyclomatic Complexity of an RPG program

Does anyone know of a tool to calculate the Cyclomatic Complexity of an RPG program?

We have these and many other metrics built into our IDE within Visual Studio with the CodeRush addin, I'm wondering if there is something similar in RDP or via the green screen?

Thanks!