Deep Thoughts with Richard Schoen

Well, I spent the past four days in Naples, FL talking with several iSeries professionals and learning about what they are doing in their shops. I was there to give a presentation on our RPG2SQL Integrator software, which is a middleware tool for talking to SQL Server and other ADO/ODBC databases from RPG. The biggest thing I learned while there is that almost every iSeries professional is working in an environment where the iSeries needs a lot of help to keep it in the thought process of the management team as a vital system that can play with other business systems. I keep talking to more and more people who are defecting or are implementing new software on other platforms such as Windows and Unix/Linux. One example of this would be the customer who is converting from JD Edwards World software which runs on green screen to the new OneWorld product which does not. They are replacing a single iSeries server with seven Windows servers to run the same application set. One of our other major customers has been told from their corporate headquarters that they are being assimilated into the corporate realm of running SAP and will be losing their iSeries running BPCS software in the next few months. While RJS is now developing for Windows and Unix/Linux, we still see the iSeries as our humble origins and would like to see the platform continue to thrive for years to come. Is there much that we can do to change the tide or is the iSeries destined to become just another plain vanilla server in the marketplace ?

OK, imagine the look on an iSeries software developers face when told that they need to write an AS/400 - iSeries Green Screen RPG Order Entry program, however they need to go out to a .Net based inventory system to retreive available quantities and they need to hit the FedEx web site to get shipping info all from a single press of function key F8.

Yeah, right !! A few years ago we would have been saying Yuk in the biggest way to an application of this type, however in today’s world with the use of Web Services, the above scenario becomes very real and pretty easy to accomplish. Basically a Web Service is a high level wrapper around a program call or business logic that allows it to be called in a standard way. If you’re an RPG programmer, liken this to calling a CL or RPG program with parameters. If you’re a VB developer, liken this to calling a COM/ActiveX object and passing parameters and finally if you’re a Java or .Net programmer, liken this to making a simple method call to a Java class.

Web Services are called via a standard data format protocol named: SOAP. Yes, I’m not kidding. SOAP stands for Simple Object Access Protocol. For those of us who like to speak English, think of SOAP as a standard way to talk to ANY Web Service, whether written in RPG, VB, VB.Net, C#, Java, etc..

When you think about this concept, imagine everybody on the planet speaking the same language and actually understanding what is being communicated. If you think about it, this is pretty powerful stuff and also the wave of the future for software development. If you’re an RPG, VB, VB.Net, COBOL, C, C#, C++, Delphi, Java or whatever type of programmer you are, you should start learning more about Web Services and how they work. Chances are there is a web service in your future.

If you’re an old RPG programmer like me, it’s amazing when you stop to think about all the new technologies for a few minutes and see what’s really applicable and what’s not. In my case and my companies future I see Web Services as the key to allowing our software to communicate and interoperate with any program on the planet.

Give me your feedback on your thoughts and experiences with Web Services and check out the following site for some cool web service examples that you can try online. WebserviceX.net