• IFSPOP–Another (And A Better) IFS Interface

  August 7, 2013 Hey, Ted

  Note: The code accompanying this article is available for download here. I read your article, Another IFS Interface, and I agree with you that IBM‘s green-screen solutions leave a lot to be desired. I got so fed up with WRKLNK, and the even more obtuse WRKFLR, that I wrote my own solution. It’s nothing fancy, but it is a lot better than what exists. It’s a green-screen solution written in RPG. I modeled it after POP, one of my favorite tools, from the System/36 days. The idea, like POP of old, is that if there is something

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• SQL and Invalid Decimal Data

  August 7, 2013 Ted Holt

  I’m sure no reader of this august publication likes decimal data errors. One single such error can ruin an entire day. The wise programmer uses tools and techniques to keep invalid numeric data from becoming a problem. One such tool that you can use to find and fix invalid data is SQL. Assume that a physical file has a customer account number stored as seven digits packed decimal, with no decimal positions. Suppose there are one or more blank records in the physical file. You query the file by customer number, like this: select * from baddata where customerid =

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• Admin Alert: Budgeting For Your Next Power Systems Upgrade

  August 7, 2013 Joe Hertvik

  If you’re acquiring a new Power systems machine in 2014, you may be preparing your capital budget right now. However, there’s more to purchasing a Power system running IBM i (Power i) than just a good purchase price. This week, I’ll look at some other expenses you may encounter when buying new hardware, and what you can do to budget correctly and minimize those costs. Budget For Operating Expenses, As Well As Capital A frequent Power i purchasing mistake is that companies sometimes make sure they have enough capital budget for new or upgraded machines, but they forget to budget

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• Control The Flow Of Stored Procedure Result Sets

  July 24, 2013 Hey, Mike

  I have an RPG program (defined as an SQL external stored procedure) that returns a data structure array as a result set. When this procedure is called from iNavigator, I can see the result set. But in our .NET client/server environment, the result set is not returned to the .NET program. Further, the .NET program first calls a “setup” stored procedure that establishes the library list and general environment settings. Thereafter this “setup” procedure calls the RPG program that returns the result set. The RPG program runs upon request from the .NET world but no result set is returned. –B.C.

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• Value An Expression? *YES!

  July 24, 2013 Ted Holt

  I find it ironic that the most commonly used CL command suffers from an annoying (if not aggravating) limitation that does not afflict many less-used commands. Fortunately, the commands you and I write do not have to have this limitation. The command to which I refer is CALL. The limitation is that the parameters must be literals or variables, never expressions. To see what I mean, look at this CALL command. call somepgm parm(%sst(&Data 5 4)) Doesn’t that make sense to you? The first parameter consists of bytes 5 through 8 of a variable named &DATA. The compiler complains, expressing

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• Automatically Answering IBM i Unable To Allocate Record Messages

  July 24, 2013 Hey, Joe

  We have a persistent problem with application jobs waiting on record locks with an RNQ1218 (unable to allocate a record in file &7) message. The record is only temporarily locked because by the time my help desk looks at it, the lock is gone and the program resumes after answering the message with an ‘R’ (Retry). Any ideas what we can do so we’re not constantly answering record lock messages? –Bob In your case, the first thing is to determine why a constantly needed record is always being locked and to devise a fix. This could be a case where

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• Presenting Vertical Data Horizontally

  July 10, 2013 Victor Pisman

  Presenting “vertical” data in a “horizontal” format is a challenging task in data management. Here is one method you can use to make SQL carry out this type of transformation. Consider table CUSTGRP, which has two fields: a customer ID and a group code. Notice that one customer can have multiple group codes. ID GROUP 100 C 100 F 100 D 200 A 200 E 200 D 500 G 700 B 700 D Here’s one way to

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• First Normal Form On The Fly

  July 10, 2013 Ted Holt

  Converting normalized data into a repeating group is a common requirement, and we have discussed that topic several times in Four Hundred Guru, even in this issue. Sometimes the need arises to convert data in the other direction, i.e., to convert a repeating group to a normalized form. This is a handy technique to know, and it’s easy. Suppose you’ve been given a spreadsheet with 13 columns of data. The first column is an item number. The next 12 columns are replacement costs for each month. You’ve been asked to load the data into a normalized table (physical

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• Admin Alert: Major And Minor IBM i Power System Upgrades

  July 10, 2013 Joe Hertvik

  When upgrading your current IBM i hardware, you may have more choices than you think. With the incredible capacity built into late model System i and Power systems, you may be able to perform a minor upgrade on existing hardware, rather than moving to the latest Power 7+ machines. Here are some tips on how you might be able to stretch your existing hardware rather than buying a new machine. What Can You Do? If you sized your current machine correctly, you may have more than enough excess capacity to stay with the existing hardware for a few more years.

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• Creating And Using i Project

  June 19, 2013 Susan Gantner

  In my previous tip, I introduced i Projects and some ways in which I use them in my development life. In this tip, I’ll show you how to create and populate your projects, and how to make use of them. Let’s first create an i Project. The easiest way to get started is to go into the i Projects perspective that is built in to RDP. WDSC also allows for the use of Projects, only they are called “iSeries” Projects. If you’re new to the tool and haven’t mastered opening a perspective, there are many ways to do it.

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