• What HelpSystems Is Up To Now

  June 13, 2018 Alex Woodie

  Thanks to a slew of acquisitions, HelpSystems has become one the largest independent software vendors in the IBM i marketplace, with tools spanning operations, security, backup, high availability, forms management, and capacity planning. A company representative recent sat down with IT Jungle at the recent COMMON PowerUp conference to talk about what’s new.

  HelpSystems didn’t have a single major product launch at the COMMON conference in San Antonio, Texas, two weeks ago. Instead the company used the event to showcase multiple enhancements, and to talk about future products — such as a security information and event management (SIEM) solution and …

  Read more

• Profound Logic Shows Off Innovation At PowerUp

  June 11, 2018 Alex Woodie

  The recent COMMON PowerUp 18 conference was a tour de force for Profound Logic, which not only showcased major enhancements to its flagship Web and mobile development tool for IBM i, Profound UI, but also swept the IBM Innovation Awards with two customer success stories.

  Let’s start with the Innovation Awards. Every year, IBM and COMMON highlight the innovative work that two companies do with their IBM i systems, including first and second place. While IBM i modernization vendors are usually well-represented in the nominations and eventual winners, we’ve never seen clients of the same modernization vendor take both first …

  Read more

• Guru: Ready or Not! Part 3 Of Big Changes In RDi V9.6, Compare/Merge, Code Coverage, and More

  June 4, 2018 Susan Gantner

  This is the third in my series of tips on RDi V9.6. In this one I’ll cover the new compare and merge support, along with improvements to code coverage and a few other smaller enhancements in V9.6. I originally thought this would be the last in the series, but IBM recently made available a new point release that introduced enough new features to mean I’ll be adding at least one more tip.

  Compare And Merge

  The ability to compare the content of two source members is not new to RDi, but with V9.6 the facility now offers the option to …

  Read more

• IBM Adds New PDM Perspective to RDi

  May 9, 2018 Alex Woodie

  IBM is receiving high marks for a new feature called PDM Perspective that it just launched in Rational Developer for i version 9.6.0.2. The new feature gives users the capability to filter libraries or members in RDi that’s very similar to the way PDM functioned in SEU. It’s so good, according to some IBM i experts, that it eliminates any reason not to use RDi.

  There are several new features in RDi version 9.6.0.2, which IBM released May 2, but it’s the PDM Perspective feature that’s getting the most attention. According to IBM, the new PDM Perspective in the Object …

  Read more

• Guru: Refactoring into Routines

  May 7, 2018 Ted Holt

  In RDi and Refactoring, I illustrated the process of refactoring by taking code of a very old style and converting it little by little into something modern. I promised to write more about the subject, and today I fulfill that promise.

  The things I did in that first article — removing indicators, removing the COMP op code, removing GOTO, and renaming variables — are great, but they are not the only refactoring techniques. One of the best ways to refactor is to create new routines or improve existing routines, especially routines that can stand alone.

  To illustrate, I’ll begin …

  Read more

• Git Started With GitHub And ARCAD On IBM i

  April 23, 2018 Ray Bernardi

  (Sponsored Content) I have been experimenting with Git as the repository for IBM i native source like RPG, CLP, and so on. Git seems to be the source repository of choice at the moment and using it for native code seems to open up a whole new world to IBM i developers. Imagine being able to branch and merge IBM i code as easily as you do your PHP code. Imagine adopting agile methodologies for native development, builds and deployments. Imagine never having to “check-out” code and jump through those hoops. That’s what Git allows, and it’s really …

  Read more

• Guru: Ready or Not! Part 2 of Big Changes in RDi V9.6, Hover and Annotations

  April 23, 2018 Susan Gantner

  If you’re one of those RDi users who doesn’t bother updating to the latest releases, listen up. I’ll bet that at least one of the new features in V9.6 will entice you to update. In Ready Or Not, Big Changes in RDi V9.6! Part 1, Key Behavior, I covered some RDi key behavior changes. Here I’ll explore some of the more noticeable — and to me anyway, more useful — features: enhanced hover text and new annotation support.

  Hover Text

  RDi has had hover text for variables and procedures for a while now. You could hover over an item …

  Read more

• IBM Kills iAccess for Windows, Older RDi Versions

  April 18, 2018 Alex Woodie

  Spring is still weeks away in the Upper Midwest, where it still feels like winter. But that didn’t stop the IBM i leadership in Rochester, Minnesota from embarking upon some spring cleaning by sending out to pasture some development tooling and admin interfaces for IBM i, including older releases of RDi and all of iAccess for Windows.

  IBM yesterday announced that effective April 30, 2019, it will withdraw IBM i Access for Windows. That announcement puts the final nail in the coffin of the old Windows-based client that traces its roots back to OpsNav.

  Here’s the short announcement posted to …

  Read more

• Guru: RDi and Refactoring

  April 16, 2018 Ted Holt

  When I first heard the term refactoring, I thought, “So that’s what they call it.” I had been refactoring for years, my only tools being SEU and a compiler listing. I learned a long time ago that refactoring is often necessary to enhance code, especially poorly written code. Another reason I often refactor is to better understand poor code.

  To refactor means to rewrite source code without changing its external behavior. Due to all the “legacy” source code (RPG II, RPG III, fixed-form RPG IV, OCL, etc.) in IBM i shops, the ability to refactor source code is a …

  Read more

• Guru: Beyond The Basics Of Code Conversion

  March 19, 2018 Paul Tuohy

  Today many RPG programmers are tasked with having to modernize existing programs. These programs often have long and varied history. They may be RPG IV programs or they may be RPG IV programs that were originally RPG II or RPG III programs, or any permutation or combination you can imagine. There are tools available to help us convert from fixed-form RPG to free-form RPG and, within RDi, we have options to help us reformat code and refactor variable names. But these tools can only go so far. We finally reach the point where we have to put fingers to the …

  Read more

Previous Articles