Yes, an IDE. For me, WDSC 7. For a lot of others, RDP, RDI, etc. They
are magic bullets. They don't do everything for you, but they do allow
you to easily see and navigate your program structures. I'm really
SHOCKED that you are programming in python but you haven't used a modern
IDE.... this really does boggle my mind. So you must do all of your
python coding via a command line editor or notepad?
I'm surprised that with using python you wouldn't be a staunch advocate of
/free format. I think that if you really gave yourself to ILE's
subprocedures, modules, and service programs 100% you would soon realize
that it is much easier to organize and maintain than the OPM way.
Thanks
Bryce Martin
Programmer/Analyst I
570-546-4777
John Yeung <gallium.arsenide@xxxxxxxxx>
Sent by: rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
06/24/2011 05:48 PM
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Re: Impossible to even think about rewriting in RPG
If people don't get religious about code, or caught up in acronyms and
buzzwords, then it's not hard to envision sticking with non-/free RPG,
and even OPM. Equally, it's not hard to envision switching to /free,
and using ILE. I'm not embarrassed to say I have not fully embraced
ILE, and almost never use modules or /free.
Does that mean I don't care about modularity and maintainability and
all the other good stuff? Of course I care. And I have no
philosophical grudge against ILE or /free. So why don't I use them?
Because they are really, really clunky given my development tools (PDM
and SEU). I cannot tell you how much faster it is for me to write
pseudomodules using OPM RPG, and just pass things via *ENTRY
parameters. It is just as modular and just as maintainable as the
average ILE programmer's modules and service programs and whatnot.
For the people who cannot live without /free and ILE features, what
are you using for your development? WebSphere and Eclipse? (Honest
question, because I have very little exposure to AS/400 tools other
than what lives on the AS/400 itself.) I have to imagine you have
some fancy IDE that does all the boilerplate for you, and all the
linking, etc.
For what it's worth, my off-hours programming is almost all done in
Python, and ever since finding iSeries Python
(
http://www.iseriespython.com), I have been using it more and more on
the AS/400 at work. So I'm a weird mix of old-school and very
new-school programmer. Mainly, until ILE RPG is convenient enough
that I can spend more time on the problem at hand, rather than
wrestling with the tools and typing endlessly just to set up
parameters or compile a working program, I will not find ILE very
compelling. (Granted, as I said, there may already be wonderful tools
out there that I simply have not used yet.)
John
midrange.com
