Re: Driving TN5250 non-interactively

[Scott Klement <tn5250@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Xavier,

The "Functions Reference" and other documents related to the 5250 
protocol are still available.  There are links from the TN5250 home page 
on SourceForge.

http://tn5250.sourceforge.net/resources.html

The fact that you're using a TCP connection (via the sockets interface) 
doesn't preclude you having to understand the 5250 protocol described in 
the Functions Reference.  If you're coding TN5250, you still have to 
understand 5250.  The socket is just the interface for sending that 5250 
data over the network.

You can, however, choose to use a different terminal type besides 5250. 
 VT100, for example (as I already suggested in another thread.)  That 
doesn't totally solve the problem, because now you have to code VT100 
instead of 5250 -- but VT100 is much simpler and closer to being 
human-readable.

Unless you're suggesting that he replace the 5250 interface with a pure 
custom socket approach.  But then he has to change the software on the 
remote server, instead of being 5250 for itnerfacing for a user, he 
needs to change it to interface with a program.  And if he does that, he 
might as well use a standard interface (such as web services) instead of 
a custom socket program.



On 7/16/2010 4:17 PM, Xavier Sánchez wrote:
> The Bookmanager Library Reader used to be distributed several years ago in a
> CD, where there were also the library itself containing shelves with the
> electronic copies of the printed material.  Now there is an on-line service
> for that.
>
> In particular, shelf QB3ANA01 "Host Communications Bookshelf", contains
> almost anything you need.  Book CO2E2001, "Functions Reference", document
> number SC30-3533-04, has a lot of that.
>
> But with all that, writing that interface is not so easy.  Wouldn't it be
> more practical to write a TCP/IP sockets interface instead?  You could write
> an ILE RPG or ILE C server program to run in batch, and talk to this program
> from your Unix-like server with your own commands and query your database.
>
> Have fun!