Re: RDI with V7R1? -- WDSCI-L

RDI is a fairly rock-solid IDE. The issues and bugs that have been
mentioned most often on this site are minor and rarely prevent anyone from
doing their work ... except maybe Ken (big smile).

(ducking for cover)

Paul

-----Original Message-----
From: WDSCI-L <wdsci-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Vernon
Hamberg
Sent: Saturday, October 10, 2020 12:23 PM
To: Rational Developer for IBM i <wdsci-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [WDSCI-L] RDI with V7R1?

Hi Dave - there's one statement here I want to ask about - others have
responded with more ideas.

A greenscreener doesn't
spend as much time as I do, learning new things and losing lots of
time with bugs (which I am sad to see are still often present with the
latest version of RDi).

I've been using RDi for more than 7 years at my current position and several
years before that at my previous position. I admit to having a kind of
hate-hate relationship with the early versions, all the way back to the
original WDSC.

But for the last many years, I have spent almost no time dealing with
"bugs". I also have had almost no downtime as a result - I'm having more
trouble with relatively slow network speeds while working from home.

Yes, there is a learning curve at first, but I think you will be over that
after not too much time. And there are features of RDi that are at least
difficult in PDM or SEU, if not impossible. One of my recent favorites is
the "Copy members to..." feature of RSE - it lets me copy source between
systems freely, and this just isn't possible with PDM - maybe with using the
QFileSvr.400 file system, but that's messy, if even possible.

The new PDM subsystem of RDi also lets you operate in ways familiar to you.
I don't use it, because we use the Turnover software change management
system, and that handles all that PDM would do. Nonetheless, the PDM
subsystem is very cool.

So carry on, I am convinced that the obstacles you might feel at the start
will vanish in short order.

Cheers
Vern

On 10/10/2020 5:51 AM, Dave wrote:

I'm currently working in a shop that doesn't have RDi. The development
team is divided into several groups, each working with different

technologies.

The AS400 team is small and of a rather mature age group. However, I
was very surprised to find that a large proportion of the developers
are still writing new programs in RPGIII. There is no use of ILE, and
all RPGIV programs are written in fixed format. Since being there,
I've installed the trial version of RDi and the 120 days has expired.
I've therefore been forced to rediscover SEU &co.
I would really like to convince the manager to buy the product. But I
need arguments. I think it would be easy to convince him if I were a

salesman.

Sometimes, particularly when I observe coworkers on their
greenscreens, I wonder if RDi really has made me more productive. A
greenscreener doesn't spend as much time as I do, learning new things
and losing lots of time with bugs (which I am sad to see are still
often present with the latest version of RDi). Rather I wonder if, RDi
is just good for morale. What I lose in development downtime I win in
organisation, speed in coding, understanding, finding, etc. But in the

end, everyone gets the job done.

Can we measure or prove that RDi would be worth the investment? If so how?

-snip-