Re: AS/400 to PC software transfer?

Rommy Henley <romster@bgbbs.com> writes:
> I need a package that will allow me to write code on a PC that will run
> on the PC and be transportable to an AS/400. We will then need to send
> PC compatible versions of the program out to our agents for them to run.
> The programs should be essentially identical. ... Baby/400 ... would be
> too expensive to buy all of the compiler licenses for several hundred
> agency PCs.


I've lost you here. Is it that the agents will learn on the 400 and then
use PCs in the field, or is it that the 400 has to process information
sent from the PCs, or what?


If in the former case, all you have to do is make sure the screen format
and key strokes are the same on both machines. That means using a
full-screen interface on a PC and not using function keys except to the
extent that they match the CMD key on an AS/400. In which case, you can
have the program written in some PC-Based language and have its output
match the AS/400 which is not as powerful for screen handling as a PC is.
Turbo Pascal would probably do a nice job. Or even BASIC (and if you are
concerned about agents knowing what is being done, compile the program.)


You can purchase an RPG compiler for the PC for about $700. You may have
to pay for runtimes, I'm not sure. If you use something like Turbo Pascal
or Turbo C, there are no run-time fees. (Except that I think that the C
language has problems.)


Realize that the architecture of the PC and the architecture of the AS/400
are wildly dissimilar; anything running on both can only use the lowest
level of compatibility between the two, which means only what can be done
on a 400.


Is there a prototyping tool on the AS/400 that might be available or might
work as a means to define what you want to do, and thus define how to set
up something on the PC?


Remember in any application - even in a compiler - it is not what language
the program is written in that counts, it is the inputs and outputs. I
have heard one FORTRAN Compiler was written in Pascal. One FORTRAN
compiler was reputed to be written itself in FORTRAN. It is not the
internal language of the program that counts, it is the input and output
results.


Paul Robinson - TDARCOS@MCIMAIL.COM
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