RE: interesting /. story on RPG

["Joe Pluta" <joepluta@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> From: James Rich
>
> I guess my point is that these aren't really RPG language things.  Of
> course trying to write a screen file compiler would be hard and probably
> stupid.  But why use subfiles and old style 5250 screens when you have qt,
> gtk, motif, tcl/tk, java, mozilla, Xlib, etc. at your fingertips?

There are a few thousand happy 5250 users who would differ with you on that.
Subfiles are not "old style" anything - they're simply the easiest way to
enter multiple instances of data.  Nothing has proven faster.  Ignoring this
simple fact is what messes up most "RPG->Unix" conversions (or RPG->HTML, or
RPG->Java, whatever you want to call it).

My experience has been that 5250-style data entry is still the most
effective, cost-efficient way to enter data.  Heads-down tab and command-key
entry beats point-and-click any day of the week for data input, and that is
what makes most businesses run.  Unfortunately, when people compare the two,
they tend to compare data mining applications, and show spreadsheets and
graphs and such, and since the CEOs and CFOs are the ones who use these, of
course they want them.  But the people who do the day-to-day grunt work of
data entry aren't looking to move to X-windows anytime soon.

Joe