Midrange Magazine (MIDRANGE MAGAZIN), the IBM i publication for the DACH German-speaking region of Europe, has published an article on CA 2E modernization to CA Plex using the ADC M3 methodology.
To view the article, please visit midrange.de web site, this PDF file, or this link.
ADC Austin has made the following computer based training (CBT) introductory course available to the CA community:
ADC Austin Tech would like to make its customers aware of the following informational webcast from CA:
9 Dec 2009
11:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. EST
Duration 60 min.
Organizations using CA Plex have traditionally found upgrades painful and costly. Although you may be enticed by the new features available in CA Plex r6.1, are you unsure of the effort which is needed to move to a new version, or how you can manage the risk of the change?
This webcast will provide some new ideas and resources that are available to the CA Plex community that will help you upgrade much more quickly and reliably to help you remain on currently supported versions of CA Plex without all the hassle.
Join CA Plex expert John Rhodes from our partner ADC Austin for this informative program. An open discussion/question and answer session will follow the broadcast.
CA Plex developers upgrading their server applications from C++ to C# will likely be interested in this white paper. This best practices guide explains the main concepts behind C# deployment, such as modules, assemblies, and code libraries. It also gives some practical advice on how to best model your CA Plex application for a .NET production environment, including information on using automated open source development tools such as Cruise Control .NET.
Wiki Page: http://wiki.plexinfo.net/index.php?title=Plex_CSharp_and_Dot_Net_Development
PDF Document: CAPlexCSharpBestPracticesPlusAppendix.pdf
This guide was developed as a collaboration between ADC Austin, CCH, and IIDEA, and is published with the kind permission of the South Carolina Judicial Department.
Information Management reports that patterns are essential to SOA in this article. And that makes perfect sense, because SOA is really about architecting for reuse. The article also reports a rise the use of highly engineered patterns, such as:
CA Plex is an ideal platform for the implementation of an SOA layer due to its pattern achitecture and availability of SOA-specific patterns like TransacXML. And in the .NET framework, CA Plex’s WCF generation capability is first class. For more information on how to construct an SOA enterprise bus using CA Plex, please contact us at sales@adcaustintech.com.
ADC Austin Tech is please to attend and present at the Fall 2009 meeting of NWPDUG, the Northwest CA Plex Developer’s User group located in Boise, Idaho, USA.
To RSVP for this event, please contact Roger Griffith
Roger Griffith, FLMI
President - Northwest Plex Developers User Group
United Heritage Life Insurance
Phone (208) 475-0941
Agenda
Thursday November 12
10:00 – 11:00 CA Plex Status and Plans/Community Update - Bill Hunt, Computer Associates
This session will highlight the current status of CA Plex along with a glimpse of what to expect in the planned CA Plex r6.5. Additionally, a global user community update will be provided including highlights from the recent CA Plex/2E Developer Conference held in Fort Lauderdale, FL.
11:00 – 11:30 Plex Upgrade Wizard – Roger Griffith, United Heritage Life Insurance
Every 18 months, CA releases a new version of Plex. In a perfect world, we would simply install it and it would that simple. The reality is, we have to recompile every DLL, in all of our applications with the new release, as they are not backwards compatible. That can be a daunting task, and is why many Plex shops tend to skip releases. United Heritage Life Insurance has created a Wizard (that uses the Plex API), to automates the task of upgrading your applications, and makes the process of upgrading to a new release of Plex as painless and fast as possible. You will be able to download this Wizard from the Plex WIKI, and get immediate value from this utility. Once you have this wizard, you will never skip a release of Plex again.
11:30 – 12:15
Mobile Devices, Barcode scanning, Plex Web Services and Migraines - Joe Berg, Ada County Information Technology
Ada County will discuss the road traveled from discontinued hardware and software to latest solutions involved in collecting barcode and other data through mobile devices and moving data between mainstream business applications. This presentation will delve into non-plex applications running on mobile devices and the challenges faced with transferring data between these applications and the AS400. We will go into the current solution which involves Bluetooth devices with the ability to interface directly into Plex applications as well as mobile devices.
12:15 – 1:00 Lunch
1:00 – 5:00
Web 2.0/Ajax Development Primer, John D Rhodes, ADC Austin
Rich internet applications (RIA) based on the Java platform are becoming mainstream. However, the complex nature posed by Ajax and Java frameworks are challenging for management and present marked challenges from a productivity and budget standpoint. This hands-on session will provide you the opportunity to see first-hand how model-based development techniques can be used to reduce risk and accelerate web application developer productivity—without sacrificing a rich desktop-like user experience. During this course you will obtain hands-on experience with solutions that help developers meet these challenges; CA Plex and other complementary RIA development tools. The content for this session has been developed exclusively for the 4th CA Plex/2E Worldwide Developers Conference.
Friday November 13
8:00 – 12:00 WebClient I+ Advanced Topics, John D Rhodes, ADC Austin
This course is designed as a continuation of the “Web 2.0″ programming course, specifically for those with some level of experience using the Websydian WebClient. Further functions and RIA development tips will help make your CA Plex-developed RIA/AJAX applications truly world-class!
Map to Ada County Benjamin Campus (400 N. Benjamin, Boise ID)
In today’s IT world, the reality is that legacy and modern code bases are co-existing in most enterprises of any size. We really like this post from TechRepublic as an effective illustration of the problem. See point 10, which lists COBOL as one of the IT industry’s top 10 dying skills. In the same paragraph, however, the article also cites the difficulty of hiring COBOL programmers, and passes on IBM’s statistic that 70% of the world’s business data is still processed by legacy languages such as COBOL.
In our view, the IBM statistic represents a reality about the state of application modernization. Application modernization is an incremental task - mission critical applications are not replaced in a week or a month, so modern code must co-exist with legacy RPG and COBOL for the foreseeable future. The key is to implement a strategy to modernize while continuing to maintain and enhance legacy code bases.
Here are two strategies to investigate.
Ramp up metadata management
Repositories and analysis tools that work across domains like RPG, COBOL, Java, and C# can help organizations manage the transition. If you are an IBM i shop, that may mean turning to a tool like Databorough X-Analysis. For zOS and Unix enterprise shops, the CA Repository coupled with source code scanners can be an ROI enhancing option. By using these tools, analysts can zero in on the parts of the application portfolio that it makes most sense to modernize, and quickly assess the affect of change across both old and new code bases.
Use development frameworks that support both legacy and modern code bases
Application development environments that manage both modern and legacy code can help ease the transition to modern technology. IBM has done a good job with their RDx line of development tools that build on the popular Eclipse IDE. You can use RDx to maintain and debug RPG/COBOL simultaneously with Java and Web Services. And IBM EGL, which generates both Java and COBOL, is part of the RDx line. Another strong contender is CA Plex, the multi-platform code generator from CA. CA Plex generates RPG, Java, C#, and C++. With the WebClient i+ generator add-in, CA Plex also generates RIA/Ajax web applications.
Eweek and Forrester Research recently report that modernization of legacy applications continues to be a top initiative for businesses this year. In fact, despite the current economy, over half of both large (64%) and small (55%) enterprises are eyeing modernization projects. The reason is simple: increasing functionality and decreasing costs are critical in this business enviroment. The economics can be very favorable: Forrester Research outlines the RIA business case in this compelling article.
If you are an ISV, software house, or ASP with a CA Plex or CA 2E based application, you are probably looking at modernization with an even greater sense of urgency. Most software vendors report that having an up-to-date look and feel as well as web based software delivery are important to increasing growth and revenues. However, writing a new RIA presentation layer from the ground up can be a very expensive and time consuming proposition.
The Websydian WebClient i+ platform offers an alternative to re-writing - a fast, powerful, and economical approach to application modernization with proven technology. If you are a CA Plex customer, you can directly generate your existing client-server application as a Dojo-based Rich UI that is deployed on a web server. If you are a CA 2E or Synon customer, you can use a combination of CA Plex and WebClient - using either ADCMS modernization to migrate your 2E app or by using CA Plex to generate a compelling RIA front end to your 2E package.
We invite you to download our new ISV White Paper for more information. And please join as at the CA Plex and 2E Event in September (Fort Lauderdale) for more information and free training.
MKS has published the following on-demand webinar.
You can access the webinar by this link: http://www.mks.com/adc-mks-ca-plex-model-based-change-management
This webcast is for those in the IBM i (System i/iSeries) community that are using or considering the use of CA Plex for application development.
Learn how organizations using CA Plex can significantly decrease overall development time while adding key audit compliance features, with MKS’s application lifecycle management platform - MKS Integrity for IBM i and the new MKS Connector for CA Plex.
The MKS Connector for CA Plex is designed to place CA Plex objects and models under the application lifecycle environment in conjunction with the Implementer component of MKS Integrity for IBM i. This offering also works with the CA 2E Change Management Option and features a powerful “Plex Model Manager” module. The Plex Model Manager module automates much of the Plex model update and extract process, and importantly tracks model updates by object and user.
This presentation by MKS and technology partner ADC Austin includes a live demonstration.
ADC Austin Tech has just completed the finale of the CA 2E/Plex European User Group tour, CA InfoExchange in Mannheim, Germany. This event is one of the largest CA events outside of CA World, and this year drew hundreds of CA customers from Germany, Switzerland, and Austria for two days of technical information sharing and user group meetings. This year’s CA 2E and Plex content was co-hosted by NIIT, one of the principal CA resellers in the region.
The venue was the Rosengarden convention center, a central location overlooking one of the principal city parks. At the conference there was a wide range of technical information presented on CA products, including CA Plex and CA 2E on a special event track. Technical presentations were made by CA, NIIT, MKS, CMFirst, ADC Austin Tech, Websydian, and others. Unique to the Germany event was a presentation by Peter Fabel on CA Plex archiving, organization, and reporting. Here is the agenda: Agenda 2009.
For ADC Austin Tech’s WebClient presentation, please click here: WebClient Presentation.
Here are some photos of the event and of Mannheim.
