eRPG (was: RE: Quick survey - how well structured are your RPG apps?)

[boldt@xxxxxxxxxx]

Brad wrote:
>Me thinks IBM wants eRPG to go away!  ;)
>
>#1 MC Best seller in MArch, double that of #2 in sales.
>(ouch, my arm!)

Congratulations!

Does IBM want CGI programming in RPG to go away?  There are
several ways to address that comment:

1) IBM did publish a redbook recently that discusses that
very subject.

2) Did my "quick survey" questions imply that we want eRPG
to go away?  I think most people understand the problems
involved in moving existing apps to have a web interface.
The problems are the same whether one implements the web
interface in RPG/CGI, Net.Data, JSP's, or any other web
development tool.

3) "Is RPG/CGI a good way to implement a web-based user
interface?"  If you asked most of us here in RPG
development I think the consensus would be no, it's not.
You know the old saw:  Use the right tool for the job.
There are simply lots of other tools that are more
appropriate for defining user interfaces.  Look, most
AS/400 programmers are quite comfortable using DDS to
define their green-screen UI's.  Writing out HTML from an
RPG program is almost like writing raw 5250 data streams!
Tools like JSP's, Java servlets, Net.Data, and even Perl
are simply much more apppropriate for web-based UI's, and
offer functionality not easily available using direct API
calls.  For example, JSP's, servlets, and Net.Data provide
easy functionality for managing session state that make it
easy to commit database updates at the end of the
transaction.

I agree that writing a CGI app in RPG is an easy way for an
RPG programmer to get something on the web quickly, but it
will be a hindrance once you need to implement something
more sophisticated.

Cheers!  Hans

Hans Boldt, ILE RPG Development, IBM Toronto Lab, boldt@ca.ibm.com


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