Re: /Free conversion (was CAPTCHA image validation in web form)

[vhamberg@xxxxxxxxxxx]

LOL Jon!

And apologies - after posting I knew I'd almost insulted you or someone - not intentional!

Yeah, lots of time IBM leave opportunities for 3rd party developers - always the risk that IBM will fill that gap at a later time.

I remember when Linoma first came out - they made an explicit statement that their utility was based on CVTRPGSRC.

Cheers
Vern
-------------- Original message -------------- 
From: Jon Paris <Jon.Paris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> 

> On 5-Sep-08, at 1:00 PM, web400-request@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote: 
>
> > Yeah, I've experienced all that - just as Linoma did a great job - 
> > better then CVTRPGSRC - that was a smash-together deal. 
>
> Ouch! Actually it wasn't like that at all. I was involved in the 
> design of CVTRPGSRC and it was a very deliberate decision on IBM's 
> part to produce a utility that did the minimum necessary to convert to 
> RPG IV - which it certainly did. 
>
> We knew that no matter how good we made the utility, it would never be 
> everything to everybody - programming style is such a personal thing. 
> So, the intent was that if we provided the basic mechanism, other 
> vendors could enter the field and "pretty it up". And that is exactly 
> what happened. I've had a soft spot for Linoma ever since because 
> they were the first one I saw and I was able to bounce into the boss' 
> office and say "See - I was right!" 
>
> These days I suspect that IBM might even have made it open-source but 
> the idea was the same - for IBM to focus on the things it did best 
> (the compiler) and let others fill the tools gap with a little help. 
>
> I think we made the right decision - when I last counted, some years 
> ago now - there were over 50 RPG conversion utilities around the 
> world. Everything from free open-source to for-fee to utilities 
> packed with other software. 
>
> It may not have occurred to you, but all(?) of the third party 
> offerings actually use that "smash-together" CVTRPGSRC for the base 
> conversion! 
>
> Jon Paris 
>
> www.Partner400.com 
> www.SystemiDeveloper.com 
>
>
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