RE: Free Form RPG Opinions Wanted

[Buck Calabro <Buck.Calabro@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jon wrote:

>I think one can make the argument that in some ways 
>the on-going upward compatibility that RPG has given 
>us over the years has done more harm than good.  Too 
>many people still code RPG II (they just use RPG IV 
>syntax).  I think it is about time that there _were_ 
>features that can only be used if you embrace their intent.

I know I am calling the fires of perdition on my head, but I agree with this
wholeheartedly.

How many times have we seen code in Program B (ca. 1990) that was clearly
copied via SEUs handy Include feature into Program P (ca. 2003)?  And how
many times did the person making the copy not really understand the code?
Think 'subfile' and I'm certain every reader here has seen an example of
that.  My point is that old code, old coding and old ideas are
_inadvertently_ carried into the new code base without thinking, simply
because it can be done without thinking about it.  And subfiles are not the
only culprit.  Old does NOT automatically equal bad, but it does NOT
automatically equal good, either.

I live and breathe 20+ year old code every day.  How I wish for something as
mundane as a single programming style.  Pushing RPG shops to a new standard
won't break me or my company.  In fact, ushering in a new mind-set should
help open the solution set so that the next generation of my application
will be faster, easier to change and more reliable than it would have been
if it were a few mods on top of the old code base.

Heresy?  Maybe.  But I have personally seen a company make small,
incremental changes to their legacy RPG code base until it was completely
obsolete.  And then shop out an alternative system on an alternative
platform.  One less RPG shop on the planet, because they hung on to their
legacy code too long.

Would twisting their arm have accelerated that move to another platform, or
would it have breathed life into the RPG solution?  Here, it's been the
latter.  We can continue to sell our solid RPG IV application today, while
engineering individual modules to a new, higher standard for tomorrow.
Nothing's perfect, but it is something to think about.
  --buck