Synon CA 2E

Web Option Updates for 2E 8.6

Mark — Fri, 11 May 2012 09:30:21 +0000

There are some nice enhancements to Web Option.

The YWRKW2EVAL command has been enhanced to make it easier to know what library the control values were used by the Web Option runtime.
HTML can now be generated from the DSPMDLUSG and DSPMDLREF screens. This ability can become helpful when developing a new application and searching for the screens that need HTML generation. This workflow also follows the 2E way of allowing developers to do the same task from multiple locations so developers can work in a way that is most effective for them.
Finally, the installation process of Web Option has been updated to make the process even easier.

This shows the continued commitment of CA in supporting the CA 2E community.

Hello Everyone!

Jason — Mon, 07 May 2012 14:36:42 +0000

Hello everyone! My name is Jason Olson and I am an IBM i Systems Engineer for a large company in Northern AR. Mark had asked me if I would be willing to write some articles in the Systems Administration realm, and I said I would be more then happy to. I am happy to say this is my first post, and each week I will add a new topic to the Systems Administration section of this site. Thanks to Mark for giving me this opportunity!

Thinking about what to start out with was really quite easy. I wanted to discuss if Systems Engineers should care about programming or not. Early on in my career I was not interested in programming at all. However, once I worked in a shop where programming was done in house, I became more and more interested. Things really took off for me when I needed to solve an issue and programming would be the easiest way. I was lucky in the fact that one of our developers was willing to mentor me, and helped me with my small project. After that I have to admit I was hooked. Now I program about 80% of my time for my job. Do I feel that not programming hinders the Systems Engineer? YES! Many tasks out there are solvable with programming, and sometimes the Systems Engineer is the only person out there with enough time to do them. Programming and programers are not the enemy of the Engineer. In fact, working together with a good knowledge of a programming language like RPG can earn the Systems Engineer quite a bit of respect. Me myself I found my relationship with developers to be much more productive since I understood the world they work in. So all you Engineers and Admins out there don’t be afraid of the programming end of our great system! It can really pay dividends in the long run.

Thanks!

Jason

Release of 2E 8.6

Mark — Fri, 04 May 2012 01:18:17 +0000

CA 2E r8.6 is now available!

There are a few excellent updates to 2E this year. The primary update is the addition of multi dimensional arrays. In addition, the splash screen has been updated as well as the function YCHKFUNPAR (Check Parameter Interfaces). There have been several important bug fixes that you can find in the release notes. If you have a CA Support user id and password, it would be worth downloading the latest documentation so you can determine the benefits of upgrading to CA 2E 8.6.

The primary purpose for the multi dimensional array is to allow external functions to call web services and return more than one value. This is accomplished by allowing the multi dimensional array to be passed as an array parameter. The parameters of an array can now be passed as a KEY(Array) or RCD(Array). In order to work with the multi dimensional array, a new built in function called *Move Array and an additional context called ARR have been added. The Building Applications guide provides detailed information on using the multi dimensional arrays with web services.

The YCHKFUNPAR (check parameter interfaces) can be used to analyze the model and find any function where duplicate parameters exist. CA 2E 8.6 checks that the duplicate parameters function option is set to N when analyzing the model. YCHKFUNPAR will identify duplicate parameters if they exist. Developers have the responsibility to analyze the results and determine the corrective action needed.

The CA 2E splash screen has been updated to display until the enter key is pressed. The purpose for this is to allow an additional option to display fixes include in the release of CA 2E that is running. The F6 key will display documentation of the fixes include in the current release. The data area YEDTMDLSYA allows the splash screen to continue without the pressing the enter key or pressing the F6 key.

CA 2E / Synon Interview Series: Question 3

Mark — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 20:15:51 +0000

The third question in the 2E Interview Series is:

If you have an edit file built over any file and you restrict on all the keys, how many records will display?

Steps to Make a Web Option Application

Mark — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 12:51:13 +0000

The basic steps to transform your 2E 5250 screens into a web application are very straight forward.

1. Install and configure the Web Option server.
2. Create a Web Option environment from your 2E model.
3. Identify the screens that will be needed for the application.
4. Generate the HTML Skeletons for the identified screens.
5. Run the new web application.

Once you have completed this initial process you will have a working web application. In order to customize the look to your company there are some additional steps you will need to follow.

1. Customize the Overall look and feel of the application. This can include:

Customizing the CSS
Customizing the Markup Language Syntex
Adding custom Javascript

2. Customize the look and feel of page elements. This can include:

Adding custom Javascript to an element like a field.
Adding custom CSS to an element like a title.

3. Customizing generated skeletons. (Optional)

You can customize a generated skeleton but every time it is generated you will need to add the customization back.
Add scripts and HTML elements to the page.
Modify the look and feel of complex pages.

It is good practice to get together with someone who has a good understanding of HTML, CSS, Javascript and web development to make the basics building blocks of your customization. Once the building blocks such as the element custom code is created any developer can integrate the customization to their application by simply generating the HTML from 2E.

Interview Question 2 Answer

Mark — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 00:34:11 +0000

What are the 5 relation types and describe each one?

File To File	File to Field
Owned By	Know By
Extended By	Qualified
Refers To	Has
Includes

•The ‘Known by’ relation defines a primary key field or identifying key field. You can have as many of these identifying keys defined as required for a unique record key.

•A ‘Qualified by’ relation is another identifying key field. These are used in situations where you may have data with the same unique primary keys and an additional qualification of a date or quantity field for instance. (An effective date or a quantity level break)

•The ‘Has’ relation is a simple attribute

•The ‘Owned by’ relation indicates a parent-child relationship between the two files. This is an identifying key field and is the key from the parent file (all the identifying key fields).

•Enforces referential integrity in the database

•Allows for Virtualization of fields (creating a Join Logical)

•Provides for automatic code generation of record selection capabilities (F4 or ? processing)

•The ‘Refers to’ relation is also a foreign key stored in the record, but it is not an identifying key field to the record.

•Enforces referential integrity in the database

•Allows for Virtualization of fields (creating a Join Logical)

•Provides for automatic code generation of record selection capabilities (F4 or ? processing

•The ‘Includes’ relation allows you to include a specified group of fields in the file.

•This group of fields is defined as a structure file

•The ‘Extended by’ relation is a relation intended to signify that a file has additional related data in another file. The extension file must still be entered using the ‘Owned by’ relation.

•This relation doesn’t add any attributes to the file (by default)

•Enforces referential integrity in the database (interactive functions will need to be ‘told’ to ignore this validation!)

•Indicates a one to one file relation.

•Allows for Virtualization

•Provides for automatic code generation of record selection capabilities (F4 or ? processing)

Multiple Line Entry

Mark — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 10:37:18 +0000

In the old days of 2E prior to 8.1, 2E fields longer than the screen width could be a bit of a problem. In order to get them to work you had to use function fields on the screen and pass the values from the function fields back and forth between the actual field and the multiple function fields. You would have to substring the long field into multiple functions fields on the screen to display the field. Then you would have to concatenate the function fields together in order to place them into the database field.

This problem was solved a while ago with 2E 8.1. You simply have to go to Edit Screen Entry Details for the field that needs to display on multiple lines and select display on multiple lines = Y. 2E will calculate the length of the input field based on the Height attribute. The Height corresponds to the number of lines to display for the field.

In this example I have a 100 character field. That will display on 2 lines of 50 characters for each line.

The Web Option Flow

Mark — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 12:32:39 +0000

Sometimes it helps to see a diagram of a process. I have created a basic flow of how Web Option processes the 2E screen as an HTML page. This will help in understanding how the different parts of Web Option fit together in the Web Option web application.

WebOption Macros and Scripting

Mark — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 02:15:27 +0000

Support for user defined macros was added in version 8.5 of WebOption. The use of macros scripting will allow the developer to record and plan keystrokes within the generated screen. By using macros and scripting you can simulate flowing through a series of screens, actually skipping the screens visually and simply moving on the web from one screen to the next. So in effect, you can reorganize some of the actual flow of your application and make it more web friendly.

CA 2E / Synon Interview Series: Question 2

Mark — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 21:26:45 +0000

The second question in the 2E Interview Series is:

What are the 5 relation types and describe each one?

Need more? CM First offers technical training on CA 2E / Synon in a variety of delivery channels – onsite, at one of our offices, or via distance learning.