What it isCGIDEV2 is a free iSeries (AS/400) based program development toolkit that facilitates the development of interactive web-based programs using RPG ILE or Cobol as the back-end Common Gateway Interface language. The functionality of this toolset is incorporated into an RPG ILE program by means of a service program that contains all of the procedures required to read input from a browser, generate and send the appropriate response back to the browser. CGIDEV2 is commonly used to generate static or interactive HTML/DHTML pages but it can also produce CSV, XML, Excel-XML and other text based files. Quick ReferencesThere are currently two versions of this package available. Both versions are free of charge and come with complete source code. One version is distributed by IBM on the IBM STG Lab Services web site. Note that this version does not include documentation or tutorials and has not been maintained in serveral years. The second version is available from the easy400.net download page at the http://www.easy400.net/ web site. For support, the easy400 forum on Yahoo Groups is your best source of support and solutions. (Yahoo Registration required). The midrange.com Web400 discussion group, and the System i network are two other discussion groups that provide related support and tips. Support can also be obtained from IBM STG Lab Services on a for fee basis. Selected articles and tutorials
Latest newsMarch 25, 2009 (easy400.net version)Added command EDBG (Enhanced debug) - Makes you faster in starting debugging CGI programs, but not only them. February 19, 2009 (easy400.net version)Added subprocedure UrlEscSeq December 18, 2008 (easy400.net version)Small enhancements: Whenever error message TCP7531, the related HTTP server PGM-QZSRCGI job is ended Error messages logged to CGIDEBUG file are now showing - if applicable - the name of the involved CGI program. April 16, 2008 (easy400.net version)This release includes a change to subprocedure WrtHtmlToStmf, suggested to the Easy400Group in order to overcome some problems related to the new line control character. August 1, 2007Despite repeated statements from IBM's Rich Diedrich and the growing popularity of CGIDEV2 in the user community, IBM has released no additional functionality, upgrades or done any marketing for this product in the past year. However in the user community, organizations like CoralTree have been using CGIDEV2 as the basis of new commercial and open source products. August 1, 2006It is one year since IBM asserted control over CGIDEV2 and not much has happened. One new command
has been added. Several bugs were fixed and several new ones introduced. Documentation and examples have
been stripped out, although we are promised that they will be put back, soon. We are still waiting for promised
news about improved session and state management. Imminent
announcements
about Open Source status have not
arrived either. By contrast MMAIL, easy400's open source email product has been upgraded and enhanced regularly with new features including
spool file e-mail, and conversion to .txt, .html, and .pdf stream files. On the bright side, CGIDEV2 continues to be very popular with the user community, packing training sessions at Common and other user conferences, and showing up regularly in iSeries periodicals and newsgroups.. March 27, 2006IBM CTC finally releases a new version of CGIDEV2 since re-taking control of CGIDEV2 last August. One new valuable feature (AppHTMLtoStmf) has been added and several fixes were made. Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2006 21:43:54 -0000
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The responseOver 300 letters went out within 7 days of the initial request. The response was a virtual flood of both loyalty to the AS/400 product line and anger towards IBM management for trying to discontinue a popular product that had shown its value to users across the world, and for trying to push its customers into unpopular solutions. |
CGIDEV2 is precisely the sort of development tool that IBM should have been
pushing since the early 90's to wean programmers away from green-screen RPG
coding. By incorporating new technology into our existing coding environment,
the leap to web based coding becomes, instead, a step - it doesn't take us
six months to become productive (ref: Java for RPG programmers - Phil Coulthard & George
Farr) .
John M.
Fermoy, Ireland
Last year we put our first iSeries based web application into production.
It was an exciting move for us because it allowed us to respond to the need
for Web applications using the platform we love. To accomplish this we used
CGI and the CGIDEV2 package.
Jerry G.
Abbot PK, IL
To develop new applications for Blackberrys and to simplify some web applications,
we decided to work with tools that would create web pages in basic HTML format,
that would be compatible to multiple devices.
George K. A.
San Antonio, TX
It also helps in progressing along the iSeries roadmap. Taking RPG programmers
to Java is very difficult. You can get them to the better tools column easily
enough, you can get them to ILE/RPG easily enough, but going thin client
with J2EE is like jumping the Grand Canyon. Thin client with CGIDEV2, however,
will help RPG shops get to the right-most columns in the roadmap.
Phil G.
South Park, PA
The company does not wish to Webface their production system but have
been able to gain a web presence using their older 150 system and
CGIDEV2. This system would not scale to Websphere, but provides a
strategic alternative to Microsoft. There are NO Microsoft or Linux
servers in the company, but they are serving over 30,000 web pages
reporting book biblios. These are refreshed locally each day.
David R.
Lancaster, Lanchashire,
United Kingdom
... Since then we have used CGIDEV2 in combination with MMAIL to generate and email formatted Excel spreadsheets, CSV and XML documents, replacing a ton of printed reports.
Dave P.
London, England
P**si Cola have gotten more comfortable with Web terminology etc. and the role of
the programming language versus knowledge of HTML etc. Following their new found
confidence, we are speaking to them about developing a SOAP/JAVA application
on the iSeries.
This is just one of a dozen case studies I could have picked to show how CGIDEV2
is not a competitor for Websphere, Java, PHP etc. It is complimentary. It allows
customers to put their foot in the water of web development and get used to Internet
terminology. This often encourages the next step.
Justin C.
Dublin, Ireland
We have convinced management at these companies to move our dynamic web sites
to the iSeries because of its performance and stability using CGIDEV2. Something
that we could &NOT& have done after showing them a webfaced version of software
running on WAS or a JSP/servlet model. The performance does not stack up.
Kevin R. T. ,
Missoula, Montana
Over the last two years we have used the CGIDEV2 source as a guide to begin
writing Web based applications for our company. Without the CGIDEV2 source
this would have been a very daunting task. But, with CGIDEV2 as a guide
it made the transition to WEB based applications go allot quicker. People
here in the company could not believe the AS/400 applications were running
on their web browser. Thanks,
Glen L,
Florence, SC
As a developer for the past 20 years I can leverage the tools I already
have with little additional training and create functional web pages in
a very short time. As the only developer at my current employer I can
not realistically learn a completely different paradigm to programming
in a reasonable time frame.
Bruce G.
Elkhorn, WI
CGIDEV2 has played a VITAL role in retaining some of our SMB customers on the iSeries
platform. Not all of our clients can afford an iSeries with enough horsepower to run
Websphere Application Server (WAS) effectively.
In addition, CGIDEV2 continues to assist RPG shops make a gradual transition from RPG
to web, allowing them to leverage existing code. Once the clients get a degree of comfort
with web applications through the use of CGIDEV2, they consider using WAS for new projects
where there is no existing code to leverage.
Brad
Montreal, PQ
I realize that the smaller customers probably aren't where IBM's
revenues are concentrated. Sometimes, though, the small customers
become big customers. If IBM doesn't support customers when they're
small then it is unlikely that they'll keep using the iSeries as they
grow.
Chuck L.
Winder, GA
We currently have two manufacturing plants which rely on a Time and Attendance
System developed using the CGIDEV2 freeware and have plans to implement this
application in additional facilities. This development framework has allowed
our developers to re-engineer legacy AS400 green screen applications for the
HTTP Server enironment without incurring addtional server software costs and
frankly , provides additional justification for the continued presence of our
AS400s.
Alan G.
Greenwood, SC
In addition to the websites, I have used the CGIDEV2 tools to bring new life
to their reporting needs. All new reports are written to utilize CGIDEV2 and
produce an HTML document that is either emailed to them (MMAIL support) or opened
directly from there iSeries utilizing STRPCCMD.
Nick L.
Englewood Cliffs, NJ
We gave them a demo of CGIDEV2. The manager looked at it and
said &Is this really RPG?& and gave us the mandate right there. It
took me and a full time RPG resource on staff about 5 weeks to re-
write and enhance their existing application.
We deployed the application using the RIM Blackberry browser as
client. Today their 200+ technicians can view their daily calls,
confirm calls, order parts, schedule appointments, close their calls
and sign off for the day using CGIDEV2.
Martin
Montreal, Canada
Giovanni Perotti and Mel Rothman have
done an excellent job of developing, maintaining and distributing this
package so far and it would be great if they and others continued to have
the opportunity to work with CGIDEV2. Please consider classifying CGIDEV2
as open source for the benefit of the entire i5 community.
Thank you,
Bill B.
Senior Programmer/Analyst
A U.S. Airline company
I believe IBM’s failure to offer a proper iSeries-specific development environment
and native, direct browser control is having a negative effect on iSeries
development and sales. I can tell you that my business is doing poorly directly
as a result of IBM’s failure to aggressively address deficiencies in the 5250
environment.
Seattle, U.S.
We are a little ISV specialized in iSeries development since 1994 and our most important customer is Banesco XXX XXXXXX (a banking organization in Venezuela using iSeries).
For years we was looking for a solution, to develop in the web world, with some characteristics like : Inexpensive, Easy to deploy in ours iSeries and in ours customers machines, Easy to learn (ours developers are RPG ILE specialists) , With acceptable performance in almost any iSeries configuration
We finally discovered CGIDEV2 that meets all ours expectations (and more!)
Wilson AQ.
Director Gerente
Caracas, Venezuela
After 3 years of showing co-workers, bosses, management what the iSeries can
do and finally getting approval to use it on our box ... you've pulled the rug
right out from underneath us. If IBM doesn't want to be a part of this global
solution fine, but at least make it Open Source like so much of the rest of the
programming world is. Throw your loyal customers, who brag about your box, a
bone so they can show the world what it can do. I personally have some web skills
and create not only powerful reports, but nice looking layouts with CSS. People
can't believe it's RPG on the AS/400. How do I tell them it's not anymore?
Bristol, PA, U.S.
As a matter of fact, just a few weeks ago I recommended the cgidev2 solution
to a friend of mine who is the CFO at another company with an Iseries. They spend
several hundred thousand dollars on a Websphere solution that failed. When I
showed my friend some examples of programs on our web site created using cgidev2
he was very impressed -- and sick over spending some much on a failed solution.
I have compared the applications that we have developed with cgidev2 to the applications
of our competitors and I firmly believe that ours are faster, easier to use,
and cost less to develop that what our competitors have to offer.
Fairfield, Alabama, U.S.
We used these tools to create our organization's first e-Gov (e-commerce)
applications - both internal (as a proof of concept) and external (as the
1st County in SC to accept online tax payments directly). We continue to
give our users the &sexy& interface
to organizational data and applications - through the CGIDEV tools. Without
the toolset, I am certain that we would be a Wintel shop almost entirely.
Columbia, SC, U.S.
I am IT manager and programmer/analyst for a small printing company in Michigan.
I have been using the CGIDEV2 toolset for a year and a half, and have
created 2 interactive websites with it. I absolutely love it, because it does
exactly what its supposed to do, and doesn't claim to be anything else than what
it is - a set of tools for programmers to quickly get their iSeries apps to the web.
I applaud IBM for making CGIDEV2 available to the subset of its customers who have
a need for such a utility and have the skillset to be able to use it. I am very much
grateful to Mel Rothman for his genius in developing CGIDEV2 and Giovanni Perotti
for being its champion and steward. CGIDEV2 is simple and it works. That is its
attraction for customers like me.
Lance K.
Madison Heights, MI
When I first tried the CGIDEV tools, I was skeptical. Just another
proprietary script, etc. Then I read about Mel Rothman and Mr. G. Perotti.
So I tried it, and it was easy and it worked. When I tweaked one of my
applications to a browser, I was amazed. I could get data on the fly and
build a web screen, with subfiles, from QDLS or from the IFS or from my
program. This machine could do anything.
Sergio DeF.
Elmhurst, IL
…The customer has a model 270 without enough CPW to run Websphere.
I was able to develop the application [with CGIDEV2] to access their data in
less time than the .Net developers took to determine the requirements.
We have many other customers with similar configurations.
Dave R.
VP, Technical Services
Baton Rouge, LA
When I downloaded the Easy400 package, our AS400 environment was in a mess.
Users no longer wanted &green screen& applications and showed no enthousiasm
as I showed them pictures of some of the templates and other offerings in
Websphere. To be honest, my job and the three AS400's we have on site
were &toast&. Every week consultants were being brought in to discuss
migrating the old systems to Windows applications, and some functions
were &lost&. Fortunately, I was able to understand and use the Easy400
package within a week or so and had a couple of applications working
within a month. This stopped the downslide and caused our users to start
thinking about what we could do for them not what needed to be eliminated
or removed.
Easy400/cgidev2 is a fantastic tool - easy to use, reliable, and efficient.
It represents a lot of what IBM has stood for over the years - a lot of what
developers such as myself have looked to you for. The gentlemen supporting this
software have done a remarkable job in making it attractive and easy to use. I am
certain that many more small to medium sized business throughout the world would
enjoy the package and its benefits if IBM would recognize it and promote it. This
is a good product which has gained a lot of customer loyalty. I strongly suggest
that you use it to your advantage. Burying it, letting it fall into disrepair
through lack of support is certainly one avenue open to you. However, chosing
that avenue is not something that you are going to get a lot of recognition and
admiration for.
Fred P.,
Systems Analyst
Thorold, Ontario, Canada
I am the manager of a web development team for a large group of companies
that resides in both the United States and Canada in the construction,
transportation and mining industries. We have looked at using java and
websphere for developing and deploying web applications for each of our 14
companies and have not been able to justify the cost in training our developers
and the equipment that is needed to run Websphere. We started using CGIDEV2 in
2001 and have not found a single application or function that we could not make
work with subsecond response time using this method. To date we have created
hundreds of application programs using this method after careful planning and
looking at several other methods including java and .net models.
Kevin R. T.
Missoula, MT, U.S.
At Harry “…” Ltd (Cold Storage & Distributors, throughout the UK....)
we use CGIDEV2 heavily. - Providing both online access for our Customers
to view warehouse stocks etc etc and also internally for passing / routing
scanned invoices for payment. Our team has also developed several peripheral
add-ons, one such being graphical visualisation of the coldstore which the Board
of Directors use and want enhancing.
We're also considering moving legacy green screen aps to GUI via CGIDEV2
(keeping core RPG skills), however until we have a firm commitment from
IBM re open source etc etc, we may find ourselves moving towards other products
like Visual RPG.Net or the like.... which obviously incurs
cost / training elements (and time away from the desk).
Considering our investment into the iSeries (currently have 2 x 820's)
and our potential upgrade to two 520's (before the upgrade path ceases)
future development is a key factor. Justifying the upgrade is primarily
based on whether or not we use the iSeries to serve GUI applications or not....
Andy R.
Group IT Manager & Analyst Programmer
Heywood, Lancs., United Kingdom
I work for an IBM Business Partner, and since 2002 we developed hundreds of
programs with CGIDEV2 tool for customers that wanted to get their
applications in web. With “…” (Turin-Italy) we developed a package
of transactions for inquiries all RPG-HTML based on ACG archives and
customer's feedback is very positive about this technique. In last year I'm
cooperating with a group worldwide leader in the field of components for
power transmissions, and in 1,5 years, hundreds of BPCS 5250 transaction
have been converted in CGI applications thanks to CGIDEV2 tool. Very
interesting too are HTML reports delivered by e-mail, and all programs are
written in rpg-ile from 6 persons writing software all days at full time.
Customer are satisfied and user are satisfied too. Personally I'm firmly
convinced that with all several solution came in last years, instruments,
platforms for web on iSeries (java, websphere, linux...) Cgidev2 represents
warrant of sure on results and continuity.
Carlo P.
Business Partner in Turin, Italy
I have used it for several years now, and all projects I did with it were very successful.
Only recently I did a presentation on CGIDEV2 for COMMON Belgium at IBM Brussels. My main
message was that, if we want the iSeries to survive, we MUST get rid of green screens FAST !
I demonstrated a sample application I had developed in RPG ILE with CGIDEV2. It was
a great success, everyone loved it !
Antoon
iSeries consultant
Antwerp, Belgium
We have been very successful in introducing new CGIDEV2 applications.
Internal Users have welcomed the quality and quantity of tools offered.
The success is outstanding. The remote access to our applications by Doctors is,
today, very popular. Other Hospitals have been granted access to our CGIDEV2
application through the Internet. It has been so successful that we have been
contacted by other businesses1 to train them in developing similar activities.
CGIDEV2 is today one of the IT department key asset. In order to maintain this
valuable asset, we would like to ask you to keep this software
package “open source”
P. Vander H.
La Tourelle, Belgium
I tried Webspere several times and found it difficult to configure and slow.
Because of several mergers by my company I have acquired some talented young
programmers. Linux, perl C++ developers. Their first question is always,
why the Iseries? It is costly to buy, websphere is not full function and
is cumbersome to use and the performance is poor. I went in search of a way
to keep a lot of our old code and still move to the web. I found it with
CGIDEV2. I could write native code and use the web at the same time, and
the performance is far superior to websphere. My development time is not
much more than doing 5250 green screen. The development on the iSeries
in CGIDEV2 is much faster than my perl programmers do on a linux system
using xml code with better performance and reliability. I even have been
able to retain my PC type personal and get them to learn and even embrace
free form RPG and CGIDEV2. And we are even going against the grain and
moving files from the PC’s running linux. Back on to the Iseries to gain
stability and reliability. The iSeries has little or no down time,
corrupted files, and best of all none of I have no idea why it quite.
And best of all the integration between operating system, security and
file interfaces.
James R
Chief Information Officer
Albany, NY
I followed already the documentations and discussions, made some basic tests and installations and have the impression from all what I have seen so far, that it is widely used, fast, secure, reliable with a lot of support and help on the web. In other words a perfect tool for RPG programmers like me to web enable my applications for the future.
Michael S.
Contern , Luxembourg
We here at “…” international were looking for an easy way to start writing reports to the web. I attended a session on CGIDEV2 first at Common and then again at the Northeast User Groups Conference and decided to give it a try. Using the CGIDEV2 tool set, we were able to produce some very nice web reports using only the RPG skills we already possessed. I realize that CGIDEV2 may not be the end all solution but it is the best &first step to the web& tool I have found. It's opened our organizations eyes to the potential of distributing information via the web. This along will make it easier to get the funding and resource we will need to gear up and train for further web development.
Richard D.
Systems Analyst