The world is changing so fast – just a banal statement? Yet there is still much to be surprised about. Who would have thought that by the end of 2003, the number of subscribers to a broadband connection would exceed 100 million worldwide ?
And the Internet phenomenon, after sustaining the speculative bubble and its aftermath, is now approaching true economic reality. Its driving influence on the evolution of consumer patterns calls for sharp adaptation from business. Our software services fit right in to this era of multi-platform developments.
ARCAD saw the need to push hard with the multi-platform trend which of course creates strong new requirements in tools.

However, how could all the new problems related to impact analysis, versioning, and deployment of heterogeneous components be covered with a single tool? How could a single methodology unify two worlds with such different cultures? These were the challenges that faced us. Today, we have come through the gamble, and this, thanks to the impressive architecture of the iSeries. We are delighted and proud to present the brand new Version 8 of the ARCAD solutions. Now, the ARCAD repository will provide you with a unified view of your software components, from both functional and technical viewpoints. ARCAD version management will build consistent sets of mixed iSeries, Windows and/or UNIX/Linux components. Deployments run in a synchronized manner on servers from different technologies. All this from one single solution.

In this issue, and the next, we’ll cover the various domains of multi-platform development : DB2, WDSC/Eclipse, versioning of PC components, deployment issues, each time with customer witness accounts in very different technical contexts. Today, we’ll talk about the specific versioning issues of PC components with the new Changer Client module. Our customer witness is the GAN who launched an Internet site based on RPG/CGI components.

I hope that these articles will offer you some concrete solutions to your unanswered questions. Our vocation as always is to bring you the benefit of our experience.

Happy reading. 

P.MAGNE, CEO

Changer Client provides versioning for PC components according to the same ARCAD methodology :

The Skipper suite targets the next phase of transfer to production and deployment. It also contains a source comparison tool with a completely graphical merge-support feature. The process of managing user requests and the linkage with impacted components is fully integrated. Companies using PC applications connected with iSeries databases will appreciate all the more the ARCAD-Skipper suite, as they can manipulate cross-references between their iSeries components and their PC components. The suite guarantees :

• Exhaustive impact analyses,
• Automatic consistency checks,
• Synchronized deployments.

Most companies with a large iSeries application base are confronted with the following problem: how can we open up the information system to the Web without having to reinvest in the business applications whose efficiency and reliability have been proven over many years? The insurance company GAN is a perfect case example. The pensions branch of the GAN group manages an extensive portfolio of life insurance contracts and pensions using a set of AS/400 applications with precise functional rules (calculation, simulation, management, …). These central applications, written in RPG and Cobol, are long tried and tested but are only accessible from 5250 screens.

To open its applications to the sales network via Intranet, the GAN software team decided to use the facilities provided by the platform: the RPG ILE (CGI) and the iSeries HTTP server. This helped them to reduce investment costs in hardware, software and training time, and achieve highly satisfactory results in terms of efficiency (response time, load testing, …).

The business application base now contains non-native AS/400 components (HTML pages, Java scripts) which are stored in the IFS directories of the iSeries. The R&D department is faced with some new issues :

Users since 1997 of the Software Configuration Management Suite ARCAD-Skipper for managing the evolutions and maintenance of their iSeries applications, the software team instinctively turned to ARCAD Software to answer these questions and more specifically towards the ARCAD Changer Client solution.
Indeed, ARCAD Changer Client provides:

ON THE AGENDA :

• Breakfast Demo presenting our browser based Help-Desk solution ARCAD-Customer, on the 1st of April 2004 at our Paris Office.

• ARCAD seminar at Skillteam, on their premises (Luxembourg) on 20 April 2004.

• International publicity campaign with Midrange Server.

Review of the ARCAD Business Partner Meeting 2004.

High positive feedback for this seminar that took place at the end of January, with 3 full days presenting topical Marketing and Technical issues around ARCAD.

We were able to give a preview of our newest features and were happy to strengthen further our privileged relationships with our partners.

Making this event a real point of exchange and source of ideas, we heartily thank the participants: Vanda, Skillteam, Simply Computing Ltd, Hoctoplus, IT integrans, Wss Italia, Polarys, Queryus, and ARCAD US for their valuable presence and conviviality.

Don’t miss the next edition of ARCAD'VANTAGE in April 2004 !

The 2nd issue in the series on multi-platform developments will be dedicated to:WDSC/ECLIPSE

Your comments / suggestions are more than welcome! Send them to :
Stephanie ZELKO szelko@arcadsoftware.com

Best regards,

The ARCAD Software team.