Re: /Free conversion (was CAPTCHA image validation in web form)

LOL Jon!

And apologies - after posting I knew I'd almost insulted you or someone - not intentional!

Yeah, lots of time IBM leave opportunities for 3rd party developers - always the risk that IBM will fill that gap at a later time.

I remember when Linoma first came out - they made an explicit statement that their utility was based on CVTRPGSRC.

Cheers
Vern
-------------- Original message --------------
From: Jon Paris <Jon.Paris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

On 5-Sep-08, at 1:00 PM, web400-request@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

Yeah, I've experienced all that - just as Linoma did a great job -
better then CVTRPGSRC - that was a smash-together deal.

Ouch! Actually it wasn't like that at all. I was involved in the
design of CVTRPGSRC and it was a very deliberate decision on IBM's
part to produce a utility that did the minimum necessary to convert to
RPG IV - which it certainly did.

We knew that no matter how good we made the utility, it would never be
everything to everybody - programming style is such a personal thing.
So, the intent was that if we provided the basic mechanism, other
vendors could enter the field and "pretty it up". And that is exactly
what happened. I've had a soft spot for Linoma ever since because
they were the first one I saw and I was able to bounce into the boss'
office and say "See - I was right!"

These days I suspect that IBM might even have made it open-source but
the idea was the same - for IBM to focus on the things it did best
(the compiler) and let others fill the tools gap with a little help.

I think we made the right decision - when I last counted, some years
ago now - there were over 50 RPG conversion utilities around the
world. Everything from free open-source to for-fee to utilities
packed with other software.

It may not have occurred to you, but all(?) of the third party
offerings actually use that "smash-together" CVTRPGSRC for the base
conversion!

Jon Paris

www.Partner400.com
www.SystemiDeveloper.com


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