RE: RPG is Dead? Say it aint so!

From: Jon Paris

>> even if it's just enough to be able to read through an HTML page and
figure out where to stick the CGIDEV markers.

I don't actually do it that way when building a page. Within a WYSIWUG
editor I simply enter the markers as data in the field/table column/etc.
But I admit I'm splitting hairs and I do understand enough HTML to do it
at the raw HTML level.

Yep, you're definitely splitting hairs. As soon as pages become more than
output, it gets much more difficult. How do you handle, for instance, an
enterable table? You need quite a bit of knowledge, especially when you
start handling the inbound data. I'm not saying you don't need that
knowledge for other approaches, just that the HTML knowledge for anything
but simple queries is actually pretty high.

>> Anybody who has deployed a properly packaged J2EE application ... can
tell you it's quite painless.

Then I can only say it has gotten a hell of a lot easier than when I was
wrestling with WebFacing a few years ago. But deployment isn't the issue.
It is the debugging when things don't work/blow up. And it is mainly in
that area that Bleddyn's comments applied (that and interfacing to .NET
based web services if I recall correctly).

You know I can't talk about WebFacing without a certain bias, since my
product is older and better than theirs (remember, I have clients who have
been live for over five years on my software <grin>). But let's just say
that measuring all J2EE implementations by your experience with WebFacing is
not necessarily a valid exercise. You should try creating a simple JSP in
WDSC and then exporting it and deploying it. It takes minutes.

As to debugging, as I said to Aaron you're as likely to have to debug the
inner EGL code as you are to debug the inner working of CGIDEV2. Instead,
you'll be debugging logic errors in the thin layer of EGL code or better yet
in your own RPG servers. In either case, you can use the graphical
debugging capabilities of WDSC to do it. Granted you can also use WDSC to
debug CGIDEV2; not so sure about PHP.

As to the web services bit, I hadn't thought about that. My initial
reaction would be that calling a web service is business logic and so should
be handled in RPG (the same way you would do in CGIDEV2). However, with EGL
you have another option: if you have any Java skills you can use something
like the JAX-WS classes and call them directly from EGL. Then of course
you'd have to debug the Java, but we're kind of veering out of the area of
basic web applications -- accessing web services will require some sort of
new skill set no matter what web application architecture you use.

Joe