[WDSCI-L] Fw: WDSC standard versus Advanced

["Phil Coulthard" <coulthar@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Joe, Jon, Mark et al, the referenced article has some incorrect
information,
probably based on early revisions of the announcement, or incorrect info
in our final announcement, as the content underwent some changes near
the end. In other words, I'm sure it is our fault :-).

First, Mark is right the overriding intent of the Advanced edition is to
make
affordable and accessible the higher priced WSAD product functionality
versus the WSSD functionality that WDSC is based on, due to customer
demand. The primary differences in WSAD vs WSSD is advanced J2EE
tooling, including exhaustive support for EJBs and MDBs. There is also
something else new in 5.0 of WSAD for creating, managing and running
testcases. As Mark said, WSAD is much more expensive the WSSD (up
to four times I think) so we wanted to bring to iSeries customers the
ability
to buy unlimited licenses of it as a competitive price. Of course, our
unique
iSeries plugins are still installable directly on top of WSAD, WSAD-IE or
WSED if the install program finds them on disk already.

This statement is true:
1. The standard version is free for anyone who has the
WDS licensed product
2. The advanced edition costs extra

Indeed, as of April 25th, to order WDSC 5.0 standard, order 5722-WDS, with
feature number 5903. Its a free upgrade.
Also as of April 25th, to order WDSC 5.0 advanced, order 5722-WDS, but
with feature nubmer 5904. Its not a free upgrade.

Here is the corrected info:

-WDSC 5 can be used for all flavours of WAS 4 or WAS 5.

-The "new distributed debugger..." is a bit misleading wording. The
distributed
debugger is the old debugger. The new one in 5 uses the same debug UI as
Java, for RPG, COBOL, CL, C and C++. It can be launched using new eclipse
launch configurations, or from RSE or iSeries Projects popup menu actions,
or by setting breakpoints in the editor and running to the breakpoint.

-The advanced list implies the support for Servlets 2.3 and JSP 1.2 is only
in
advanced. This is not the case... WSSD has the servlet and JSP tooling too,
and hence so does WDSC standard.

-WSSD (and hence WDSC std) has concurrent support for both 4.0 and 5.0

-WSSD (and hence WDSC std) has all the built-in test environments for 4.0,
5.0
and 5.0 express. They both support TomCat if you install TomCat locally.

-The iFrame portlet support mentioned is for WebFacing.

-The "support for the iRAD Struts Builder and Struts Development tools":
This
iRAD Struts Builder is now called the Web Diagram editor and it and the
other
struts development tools are in WSSD/WDSC standard as well. This includes
the iSeries Web tools extensions to the Web Diagram editor so that you can
create a struts action from *PGM/*SRVPGM business logic.

-The WebFacing support for Struts however is only in the advanced product,
as
it is primarily for a select audience of ISVs who want to extend the
capability of
WebFacing by extending it. The WebFacing support for working with spool
files
is shipped as an example of how to do that, and hence it too is only in
advanced.

-All the enhancements to RSE are in both flavors. All the enhancements to
iSeries
Java Tools is in both flavors. All enhancements to the iSeries debugger are
in both
flavors. All enhancements to the iSeries Web Tools are in both flavors,
except
advanced support for a JCA-compliant connector for calling RPG from Java
(standard continues to use toolbox without the JCA skin). The vast majority
of the
WebFacing enhancements are in both, with the exception of the struts
support, the
spool file support and the iFrame portlet support. However, both flavors
get better
and faster conversion, faster creation of WAR files that are smaller,
improved
execution performance, and numerous enhancements including the ability to
place
fkey buttons where you like, including inside for WINDOW records (very
popular
requirement). There are many other enhancements to webfacing as well, and
they
will continue to come via service packs, for both flavors of WDSC.

-And to be 100% clear, Webfacing in either flavor of WDSC allows you to
avoid
interactive pricing in the new iSeries servers. Indeed, there is still only
one
Webfacing runtime, no matter what flavor of tool is used, and it remains
priced
at 0$ in all currencies.

Hope this helps clear up the confusion.

Phil Coulthard, iSeries Software Architect,  IBM Canada Ltd.
coulthar@xxxxxxxxxxx 905-413-4076, t/l 969-4076