Re: George Farr declares featurespecificpricingonhorizonfor WDSC

Yeah, if IBM policymakers let the Lab develop a GUI screen designer that

RPG programmers will scream for, I'll pay extra for it.  Not when.  If.

Your post made me realize that I should qualify my statements more.  When I
am talking about new features, they include the development of the RPG
language.  George is dropping A LOT of statements about the RPG today being
incredibly different than the RPG of tomorrow (I have no idea when tomorrow
will be here).  The thing that has caught my attention the most are the
comments towards RPG being able to natively talk to a browser or thick
client (the latter of this I am not so sure of).  I am incredibly interested
in this as long as they can keep a Java runtime out of the mix.  If they
introduce a Java runtime they might as well chalk it up as a loss IMO. 

Imagine having a RPG native way to create browser and thick client apps from
the iSeries!  The probability of this happening 'natively' is less the more
I hear George talk though.  After the keynote address I get a very strong
feeling that they are trying to get RPG programmers into Java or EGL (read
platform independence - which makes no sense to me).  I kinda see their
reasoning as Java obviously has more industry acceptance and features, but
the simple fact of the matter is that Java, in all of its complexities,
CANNOT compete with RPG from a business language standpoint on the iSeries.
What if we don't want platform independence.  What if we actually WANT to be
tied to the iSeries because of all the other benefits we get with intimate
integration of language DB and OS.  He mentioned that a lot of the direction
they are getting for their platform independence initiative comes from
vendors wanting to run their products on the iSeries.  I think they are
missing out on the silent voice of the thousands of IT shops out there
pounding out home grown RPG apps that would instead like those development
dollars to go towards RPG enhancements.  Imagine the RPG we would have today
if the past 3 years of "platform independence" budget would have been put
into the RPG budget.  Ok, now I am dreaming.

I think they could change RPG enough (including the language name) that it
would bring in new accounts by the hundreds.  That is one of my reasons to
wanting 100% free form - simply so people aren't alienated when they learn
it.  The key is to keep it native and platform dependant because as history
has shown that is where we get our reliability/robust-ness.  Just imagine
having an uncomplicated development environment and language on the most
stable platform out there where writing applications can take second place
to meeting business needs.

My thoughts.
Aaron Bartell

-----Original Message-----
From: wdsci-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:wdsci-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of Buck
Sent: Monday, March 26, 2007 10:59 AM
To: wdsci-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [WDSCI-L] George Farr declares
featurespecificpricingonhorizonfor WDSC

If IBM can produce something that is
good enough, there will be many
that will pay for it.

You said a mouthful.

WDSC is not what RPG programmers want.  They are casting that vote every
day.  I was in one place where I was the sole Code/400 user out of 50+ RPG
programmers.  RPG developers are far and away the largest group of System i
developers.

RPG developers _might_ be interested in a GUI version of PDM that looks like
PDM, is as fast as PDM and maybe is extendable beyond PDM.  RPG developers
want a GUI editor that's as fast as SEU, as easy to use as SEU and is
perhaps extendable beyond SEU.  I personally think that Code/400 was closer
to that mark than WDSC is, but Code is dead and I have to get over that.  I
recognise the issues the Lab has had to go through to warp a stream oriented
IDE for use with a record oriented platform and I applaud them for their
effort.

Yeah, if IBM policymakers let the Lab develop a GUI screen designer that RPG
programmers will scream for, I'll pay extra for it.  Not when.  If.
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