Re: [WDSCI-L] Plug-ins from iSeries Vendors

[Scott Johnson <sjohnson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Mark,
I can understand the issue of Swing vs SWT, but I did a Google and one of the 
first hits sold a converter for $60.  The after screen shots did not look that 
bad.  And yes I understand it would take more work.  I would have to agree that 
they are not quite getting the WDSC thing yet.  Heck most of them are barely 
getting the GUI thing.
We can only hope that IBM takes it to the next level and bases all their tools 
on the Eclipse 3.0 client framework.  It sounds like they are off to a good start.

-- Scott J

Mark Phippard wrote:

> In fairness, the Eclipse GUI (SWT) is unique to Eclipse.  So while a 
> vendor already using Java has a leg up on say the Code Designer team which 
> has to port from C/C++, rewriting your UI is still a big deal.
>
> In Eclipse 3.0 there is a better facility for integrating AWT/Swing into 
> the UI.  It will create somewhat of a FrankenUI but it will be a little 
> better.  Vendors will still have to do a fair amount of work to get their 
> Swing code running, but it provides a better transition option for them.
>
> Finally, I think a lot of iSeries vendors are not convinced that WDSC will 
> "take off" and are hedging their bets, perhaps hoping it will fail. 
> Personally, I think it has already taken off, especially if we can judge 
> by the number of new customers we are seeing, not to mention the existing 
> customers that have adopted it.  In my opinion, I think when these vendors 
> hope that WDSC will go away someday they are failing to see the investment 
> that IBM is pouring into Eclipse.  Virtually all IBM GUI's, even 
> non-development tools, are being moved onto this framework.  I do not see 
> IBM walking away from it, I only see the adoption increasing.  People in 
> the general marketplace are paying $2K-$4K per user to use these tools and 
> we get them for "free".  We are getting a great value and the tools are 
> only getting better and better.
>
> We were fortunate in that we recognized this potential early on, and with 
> the previous work we had done for our existing Windows C/S apps written in 
> C++ we already had separated our business rules from the UI.  So while we 
> had a lot of work to do, it also allowed us to rethink the UI and really 
> get it right.  At the same time, we had a rich backend that we could very 
> easily tap into without worrying about that important piece of the puzzle.
>
> Thanks
>
> Mark