What is EGL?

In today's world, web solutions should ideally be simple and quick to build. Often, the reality is very different.

Well imagine a tool that can help you try and achieve that goal, allowing you to focus on the business solution rather than the technology. At the same team this tool can enable you to move towards Java development if that is what your team needs, producing Java code without the need to know everything about the Java environment.

This is what EGL can do for you and the best thing for many System i5 (AS400, iSeries) companies is that you already have the code. If you have one of the compilers you are entitled to the WDSc PC development environment. As part of this you get the EGL development tool, which is integrated into the workbench.

Webinar

The following two windows media files cover the two key parts of our exciting EGL webinar. They are both large files and will take some time to download. If you have any questions at all about EGL and the presentation please contact me bleddyn.williams@morpheus.co.uk

• The first is a powerpoint overview with audio explaining what EGL is and some of the basic components. (View File 1)
• The second is a demonstration in setting the environment up and actually producing the code for the two examples below. (View File 2).

Presentation Additional Notes

• It is worth noting in this presentation that the setup steps that we run through in the online demo only need to be done once in your workspace.
• A small piece seemed to skip on the demo stage when setting up EGL in your development environment. To do this you need to go to preferences >> workbench >> then the EGL section.
• We have found that when working with the Rational (WebSphere) Workbench, the best way to create your workspaces is from the root create a directory called workspace. Then create each of the workspaces required under it. That helps with the next step where you want to have common objects accessed by multiple workspaces.
• On the step for setting up the datasource in the WebSphere Environment on the PC we need to set the path for the Toolbox driver. In the presentation we do this very quickly, so here is some more information. On the iSeries you are going to connect to for the database, copy the file JT400.jar from \QIBM\ProdData\HTTP\Public\jt400\lib and create a directory in your workspace area called JT400. If you place the file in that directory then when you set the environment variable you can indicate that the location variable is the directory the file lives in.
• The Data parts wizard does have some limitations when defining access to the database. It is fine for single tables but another option is using the SQL Retrieve is a better approach where you want to join tables.

Additional Web Sites

• Jon Sayles this site is from Jon Sayles part of the Eco team for EGL lots of great examples including the full EGL Samples workspace project.
• EGL Developerworks lots of useful code examples and documentation about the products.
• Hello World learn how to create a Java Web application without knowing the Java language using Rational Business Developer Extension