System iNetwork

Quote: "There is nothing else out there to match EGL Rich UI for drop-dead easy development of awesome Web 2.0/RIA apps."

Uh... this claim is a bit of a stretch, isn't it?

I've seen some products that make "awesome Web 2.0 apps" and don't use old Cobol technology behind the scenes.

If EGL is so easy, awesome, and unmatched, then how are the other vendors making money with their technologies, and why does IBM need to give a lite version away for free...?? I would contend that despite the propaganda, EGL has not gained traction and that's why they now want to give it away.

For RPG-based shops wanting to make Web 2.0 apps, maybe they should check out something like Valence instead. It's written in RPG for RPG developers and actually does make awesome Web 2.0 apps. It's not free, but probably cheaper in the long-run than dealing with EGL.

There are probably lots of product vendors out there that would beg to differ on Mr. Darnell's claims. But of course I can see why an EGL consultant would want to make a claim like this.

Confused!

Rational told us that you could not ~buy~ EGL, but you could buy the toolset that created EGL applications. Now they give us a toolkit, but unofficially call it by the name of the language and a price? And, as with anything that sounds too good to be true (free?), what is the catch?

Sounds like the last gasp of a ~language~ that has not been breathing.

I concur with Anders. For an RPG shop to embrace EGL instead of something like Valence (www.cnxcorp.com), that keeps them with their familiar (and heavily invested) RPG environment, it would be just silly to move away.

Now, for a Java shop I would imagine EGL would have some nice appeal because it would be a step up into an easier syntax that is more procedural and business oriented. We already have that in RPG - we just lack the nice GUI tooling.

EGL is just too dangerous to adopt yet. If it isn't successful guess what IBM will do with it: they will scrap it. You will be left with a proprietary language that has far less programmers available for hire than RPG. Is it fun to develop applications in it and would it be good for prototyping new applications? Sure. But for a 10 to 15yr outlook on my IT infrastructure I am not yet ready to bet the farm on it.

As far as it being free (finally) - honestly I don't know what IBM was thinking when there are countless other Java-like technology frameworks/syntaxes/etc out there that are "free". If they don't think big enterprises are using free/open-source/open-spec technologies then they need to look again.

On a final note I wouldn't mind doing a project in EGL as there is always something to learn by picking up a new framework/syntax. Afterall, programming is still fun, right? :-)

Would it be impertinent of me to suggest that EGL is now priced correctly?

My comments to Chris reflect my honest opinion based on my personal experience but I understand that different people have different needs. I would encourage everyone to have a look at EGL Free when it comes out and to form their opinions about it based on some hands-on use.

Would it be impertinent of me to suggest that EGL is now priced correctly?

Yes, and no. It's not that you get what you pay for (zero in this case). It's not that EGL Free would have no value. But offering a free license is about the only way for any new language/generator/compiler to gain traction - given current market conditions.

What are current market conditions? On one hand you have Microsoft aggressively churning out languages and developer IDE's, and offering free editions. On another hand you have free & open-source alternatives. There are so many free tools and frameworks out there that even a company like IBM can't gain market share without doing likewise.

Microsoft, IBM, and Oracle however are in the enviable position of making up the cost of creating developer tools by charging for operating systems, middleware, and database server products instead.

Microsoft builds special interfaces for their database into .Net developer tools, offers a free edition of the tools, but charges $25K for SQL Server - Enterprise Edition. IBM does similarly, but charging license fees for Websphere Application Server, DB2, AIX, z/OS, or IBM i OS.

There are formidable barriers to market new developer tools. That's unfortunate for a lot of innovative, smaller players, but Microsoft, IBM, and Oracle seem to have the means to build & offer free editions.

And developers have come to expect that!

-Chad

There is nothing else out there to match EGL Rich UI for drop-dead easy development of awesome Web 2.0/RIA apps

Some things in the IDE are easy. Some are not. Configuring build descriptors for various generations options is like learning a new language in and of itself.

RDI SOA has enormous scope. It takes a while for developers to understand what the tool is doing behind the scenes. Some will never understand.

It's easy to get sucked into the power of code generators. It's a lot easier to build something from an existing template, and have the build process automated. I use CL scripts to generate RPG, HTML, and JavaScript - as an alternative to tools like RDI SOA.

I just bit the bullet and learned HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. It was a challenge at first, but got easier. Now I'm glad I did.

Over time, I've written and accumulated a good library of objects and functions that I use in nearly all applications. It's easy to extend an object or change a function, because I understand what it's doing. It's hard to get that level of understanding when using a code generator.

-Nathan

It will be interesting to see where we are at in about 2013 because at that point we will most likely have new versions of the "browser technologies" (i.e. HTML, Javascript, CSS) and also some refined browser plugins like Flex, Silverlight, and JavaFX. Right now everybody is having to develop patterns and find the best way to do xyz. Pretty soon I would have to imagine there will be much more solid approaches to developing modern UI apps. Big companies like Microsoft can no longer play as much of the role of saying "we will create the technology and force everyone to follow us" because that has proven to bite them in the butt with the decent adoption of FireFox and ok adoption of Flex based apps. Just imagine if we didn't have to be so concerned about the underlying technologies and instead could just focus on business logic - I am waiting for that day to return.

Aaron Bartell
http://mowyourlawn.com

Quote: "There is nothing else out there to match EGL Rich UI for drop-dead easy development of awesome Web 2.0/RIA apps."

Thanks to Aaron Bartell for his thoughtful comments and contributions.

Why not combine EGL into RPG ILE and get the best of both worlds? This would once again make RPG a leading programming language, after 20 years of neglect and decline.

IBM is so fixated with charging for every product and everything as a profit center that it has lost almost everything and certainly the big picture.

I agree that EGL represents a higher risk environment for Web development. In most scenarios I've seen, companies prefer a productive, standards-based (not proprietary) language / toolset that is multi-platform with a larger market acceptance, 3rd party support and a strong user community as a lower risk investment alternative.