• The Four Hundred
  • Subscribe
  • Media Kit
  • Contributors
  • About Us
  • Contact
Menu
  • The Four Hundred
  • Subscribe
  • Media Kit
  • Contributors
  • About Us
  • Contact
  • Krengel Challenges Shops to Keep UPS Shipping Apps on IBM i

    July 10, 2012 Alex Woodie

    Krengel Technology is currently offering 20 hours of free custom development to IBM i shops that reject the free UPS shipping program called WorldShip, and implement its IBM i-based Krengelship instead. Considering the UPS product is free, and Krengelship costs thousands of dollars, one wonders whether this offer really holds water. But as the adoption of Krengelship by logistics business Jacobson Companies shows, there are other costs to consider besides licensing.

    WorldShip is UPS’ high-end shipping software for organizations with a large volume of shipments or pickups with UPS (or at least 25 per day, according to the company). The Windows-based program enables the user to print labels and other documents, capture billing information, schedule pick-ups, and track shipments (ground, air, LTL freight, and air freight) to 200 countries around the world. UPS supports various integration methods with WorldShip, which can be freely downloaded from the UPS website.

    Krengelship delivers the same core shipping capabilities as WorldShip. The software, which interfaces with UPS’ shipping system via 12 APIs that UPS makes available to customers and third-party software vendors like Krengel, offers handy features like street-level address validation, time-in-transit comparisons, pricing rate requests, and real-time package tracking. Anything that can be done with WorldShip can be done with Krengelship, which was introduced two years ago, has been enhanced twice, and is now at version 2.1.

    While the two products do basically the same thing, there are some important differences between them, according to Adam Taylor, the lead developer of the product at Krengel.

    For starters, that Krengelship works in real-time, while WorldShip is primarily a batch-oriented product, sending transactions and requests at the end of each day, Taylor says. Krengelship (or KSHIP) enables a user to prepare a package for delivery, including printing out a UPS shipping label on a Zebra ZPL-compatible printer, in about 30 seconds, Taylor says.

    There’s also the matter of where the software runs. WorldShip runs on the client Windows OS (not on Windows Server), whereas KSHIP runs on the IBM i server OS. For an organization that is already running IBM i applications, it makes good sense to run the shipping app there too, Taylor says.

    “Going with KSHIP allows you to eliminate a point of failure in your shipping process,” he says via email. “And for businesses that rely on shipping who need flawless uptime, why wouldn’t you want to centralize your shipping process on the IBM i, the most reliable platform in the business?”

    Built-In Integration

    Integration with RPG applications is another KSHIP advantage. While a developer at an IBM i shop could hand-code the integration between WorldShip and existing RPG applications using the UPS APIs, Krengel has done much of that work already.

    This was the key differentiator factoring into the 2011 decision to implement KSHIP over WorldShip at Jacobson Companies, a multi-billion dollar logistics services company with operations all over the world.

    Jacobson was looking for a way to automate UPS deliveries from a custom-coded warehouse management system running on an IBM i server, according to Mike Driscoll, an application developer at Jacobson. The company was moving away from another IBM i-based shipping app that was overkill for the needs of its warehouse operation in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania.

    “We definitely considered [WorldShip], but it came down to integration,” says Driscoll, who is based in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania. “We were basically duplicating our effort. We’d go into our WMS and ship off the product, and then would have gone into WorldShip and re-entered that information. We’d be taking a step back by going to WorldShip because we had the previous integration with the other product. We were looking for that tight integration that was pretty much transparent to the user.”

    Driscoll could have done the integration work himself. “It was a matter of, ‘Do it we do it ourselves and interface to the UPS WorldShip using their APIs, and go through that whole development cycle and have the approval process that KSHIP has already gone through?'” he says.

    In the end, Driscoll decided it made better sense to license KSHIP, even though it was a fairly new and unproven product. “We did catch them early on in their process. So we helped them cut their teeth, and vice versa,” he says. “But it was, having said that, a fairly smooth integration, and it’s proved out useful.” Jacobson also runs WorldShip, but only as a backup to KSHIP.

    Krengel is ramping up its KSHIP vs. WorldShip campaign. In late June the company announced its “30 day challenge,” in which it offers up to 20 hours of services from one of its lead IBM i developers to any IBM i shop committing to a trial of KSHIP. The deal was originally slated to end on July 19 (but Krengel might extend it if you ask real nice).

    For more information on the product or the challenge, check out the company’s website at www.krengeltech.com.

    RELATED STORY

    Krengel Offers Shipping App for UPS



                         Post this story to del.icio.us
                   Post this story to Digg
        Post this story to Slashdot

    Share this:

    • Reddit
    • Facebook
    • LinkedIn
    • Twitter
    • Email

    Tags:

    Sponsored by
    Rocket Software

    Meet digital age demands while maximizing your IT investment.

    Future-proof your mission-critical applications with Rocket® Solutions for IBM® i that keep your business ahead of the curve.

    Learn More

    Share this:

    • Reddit
    • Facebook
    • LinkedIn
    • Twitter
    • Email

    Sponsored Links

    Maxava:  When disaster strikes, you're in control with Maxava HA Enterprise+
    looksoftware:  FREE Webcast: Leverage mobile technology with IBM i. EMEA: June 26, U.S.: June 27
    T.L. Ashford:  Barcode400 Labeling Software makes it easy to design and print labels in minutes

    IT Jungle Store Top Book Picks

    BACK IN STOCK: Easy Steps to Internet Programming for System i: List Price, $49.95

    The iSeries Express Web Implementer's Guide: List Price, $49.95
    The iSeries Pocket Database Guide: List Price, $59
    The iSeries Pocket SQL Guide: List Price, $59
    The iSeries Pocket WebFacing Primer: List Price, $39
    Migrating to WebSphere Express for iSeries: List Price, $49
    Getting Started with WebSphere Express for iSeries: List Price, $49
    The All-Everything Operating System: List Price, $35
    The Best Joomla! Tutorial Ever!: List Price, $19.95

    PHP Web Development Gets RPG Summit Spotlight DB2 For i XMLTABLE, Part 2: Using Namespaces And IFS XML Files

    Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Volume 12, Number 19 -- July 10, 2012
THIS ISSUE SPONSORED BY:

looksoftware
Help/Systems
Tributary Systems
HiT Software
RJS Software Systems

Table of Contents

  • Krengel Challenges Shops to Keep UPS Shipping Apps on IBM i
  • New Orleans Company Applies Katrina’s Lessons to New DR Strategy
  • ProData Updates DBU and Deleted File Retriever
  • Kisco Refines IBM i Database Auditing Tool
  • Synergivity Developing New Menu System
  • Mule ESB Development Goes Visual
  • Infor Gives HMS an iPad Interface, Lands New M3 Customer
  • InfoPrint Designer on Windows 7? DocPath Says It Can Do It
  • Townsend Gets Added to GSA Schedule
  • Tomcat 7 Support Added to mrc’s m-Power Dev Tool

Content archive

  • The Four Hundred
  • Four Hundred Stuff
  • Four Hundred Guru

Recent Posts

  • POWERUp 2025 –Your Source For IBM i 7.6 Information
  • Maxava Consulting Services Does More Than HA/DR Project Management – A Lot More
  • Guru: Creating An SQL Stored Procedure That Returns A Result Set
  • As I See It: At Any Cost
  • IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 27, Number 19
  • IBM Unveils Manzan, A New Open Source Event Monitor For IBM i
  • Say Goodbye To Downtime: Update Your Database Without Taking Your Business Offline
  • i-Rays Brings Observability To IBM i Performance Problems
  • Another Non-TR “Technology Refresh” Happens With IBM i TR6
  • IBM i PTF Guide, Volume 27, Number 18

Subscribe

To get news from IT Jungle sent to your inbox every week, subscribe to our newsletter.

Pages

  • About Us
  • Contact
  • Contributors
  • Four Hundred Monitor
  • IBM i PTF Guide
  • Media Kit
  • Subscribe

Search

Copyright © 2025 IT Jungle