Note: The code accompanying this article is available for download here.

If I’ve heard it once, I’ve heard it a thousand times: “The AS/400 is a legacy system with character-based data that is good for nothing but running batch programs.” That sentiment drives me right up the wall. In all fairness, however, the traditional iSeries/RPG programmer has done very little to prove these nay-sayers wrong. Sure, every once in a while you will see an RPG programmer throw some nice colors on a display file or maybe even use a message subfile, but while those were pretty cool tricks

In an earlier tip, I explored questions I often hear about binding directories. In this tip, I’ll explore another commonly asked ILE question and give you my perspective.

Question: How many service programs should I have and how big should they be?

Answer: It depends.

Don’t you hate that answer? But in this case, I do think it is completely application dependent. Often when I am asked this question, the emphasis seems to be related to performance. But I don’t think the decision on the “what” or “how much” to put into a service program should be made based

In a recent article, I presented a technique for porting image catalog files between Power i systems. Afterward, a reader contacted me with an equally valid ways of moving image catalogs around that may even work better than my technique. This week, I’ll look at his suggestion and see how it can make life easier when porting optical media to remote systems.

My Solution

My original solution to porting an image catalog and its associated files from a source to a target machine consisted of the following steps:

1. Create a virtual optical device that can be used to read