Re: Problem with iToolkit in Node on Windows -- WEB400

Dear IBM,

Java developers need a package that lets them remotely connect to the IBM i (jt400.jar), but Node developers don't?

Thanks,

Kelly Cookson
IT Project Leader
Dot Foods, Inc.
217-773-4486 ext. 12676
www.dotfoods.com<http://www.dotfoods.com>

From: WEB400 [mailto:web400-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Tim Fathers
Sent: Thursday, March 22, 2018 4:42 AM
To: Web Enabling the IBM i (AS/400 and iSeries) <web400@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: [WEB400] Problem with iToolkit in Node on Windows

I know nothing about the libraries you're trying to use so I'm not sure how much help the following will be, but I did have a quick look out of curiosity. The itoolkit has a dependency in istoredp.js on "idb-connector", this isn't included in the itoolkit's package's dependencies so it has to be installed separately with "npm i idb-connector", the problem is that this package has dependencies on binary objects which appear to be platform specific to the IBM i, meaning you cannot use this library on a platform other than the IBM i.

Your frustrations are along the lines of what I mentioned way back in one of the other threads somewhere about a lack of decent DB2 (or any other) database drivers for NodeJs. In Java, if you want to access a database, you get yourself a JDBC driver and away you go, you can point it at the local or a remote database seamlessly (so you can do what you're asking and run an app on a PC server to connect to a database on the IBM i). Often the JDBC drivers come in two flavours, one native and one "pure Java" (called a type-4 driver), this means you can in theory switch in the faster driver when you are running Java on the same platform where the database resides. As far as I can tell, this whole concept is missing from node.

If you just want to access the database then I believe this package will allow you to reach across from your PC to the IBM i https://www.npmjs.com/package/ibm_db<https://www.npmjs.com/package/ibm_db> but as for executing commands and accessing native objects I don't know, I've never really looked into it.

________________________________
From: WEB400 <web400-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx<mailto:web400-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx>> on behalf of Kelly Cookson <KCookson@xxxxxxxxxxxx<mailto:KCookson@xxxxxxxxxxxx>>
Sent: 22 March 2018 04:57
To: Web Enabling the IBM i (AS/400 and iSeries)
Subject: [WEB400] Problem with iToolkit in Node on Windows

I installed Node on my Windows 7 laptop.

I went to the npm site (https://nam03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npmjs.com%2Fpackage%2Fitoolkit&data=02%7C01%7C%7C033d1e68855b412f855808d58fa92a1f%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636572879070409152&sdata=N4DzS260jiJn3uNE0oG%2B9UEWkLbO89Dr6U878mhlmnY%3D&reserved=0<https://nam03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.npmjs.com%2Fpackage%2Fitoolkit&data=02%7C01%7C%7C033d1e68855b412f855808d58fa92a1f%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636572879070409152&sdata=N4DzS260jiJn3uNE0oG%2B9UEWkLbO89Dr6U878mhlmnY%3D&reserved=0>) and installed iToolkit using the command: node i itoolkit

I wrote a small script named helloIBMi.js shown here:
const xt = require('itoolkit');
var conn = new xt.iConn('mysystem', 'myname', 'mypwd');
conn.debug(true);
console.log('Current XML Service Library is : ');
console.log(conn.getConnection().I_XML_SERVICE_LIB);
console.log('end script');

This script worked. It made the connection and returned the service library name:

node helloIBMi

Current XML Service Library is :
QXMLSERV
end script

I then tried to add a command from example on the API page (https://nam03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ibm.com%2Fdeveloperworks%2Fcommunity%2Fwikis%2Fhome%3Flang%3Den%23!%2Fwiki%2FIBM%2520i%2520Technology%2520Updates%2Fpage%2FToolkit%2520for%2520i%2520APIs%3Fsection%3DiSh&data=02%7C01%7C%7C033d1e68855b412f855808d58fa92a1f%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636572879070409152&sdata=Y8zDfokMJLH7mCvcujqLXYh6rxBZ%2BJ4jYA%2FgfFhGr88%3D&reserved=0<https://nam03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ibm.com%2Fdeveloperworks%2Fcommunity%2Fwikis%2Fhome%3Flang%3Den%23!%2Fwiki%2FIBM%2520i%2520Technology%2520Updates%2Fpage%2FToolkit%2520for%2520i%2520APIs%3Fsection%3DiSh&data=02%7C01%7C%7C033d1e68855b412f855808d58fa92a1f%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C636572879070409152&sdata=Y8zDfokMJLH7mCvcujqLXYh6rxBZ%2BJ4jYA%2FgfFhGr88%3D&reserved=0>). I tried to delete a file in the IFS using the iCmd class:
const xt = require('itoolkit');
var conn = new xt.iConn('mysystem', 'myname', 'mypwd');
conn.debug(true);
console.log('Current XML Service Library is : ');
console.log(conn.getConnection().I_XML_SERVICE_LIB);
conn.add(xt.iCmd("RMVLNK OBJLNK('/mydir/nodetest.txt')"));
function cb(str) {console.log(str);}
conn.run(cb);
console.log('end script');

This fails. The "conn.run(cb)" line is what throws the errors. The errors I get in the console are:

node helloIBMi