Background:
Migration of a Natural application from a Mainframe to a PC Server environment …
.
Questions:
Q1) Can we provide a utility to convert all Natural MAPs into Natural DIALOGs ?
Q2) Or can you suggestion ‘how’ to achieve such a conversion, please ?
Hi Peter,
What do you want to achieve with a conversion? Natural MF maps can run on the PC without any conversion. Whereas Dialogs cannot run on MF.
Best regards,
Mogens
Hi Mogens,
Yes, I know that Mainframe MAPs run just fine on Windows :roll:
.
We have a Customer, who is downsizing + modernising an application.
They are going to Tender for a solution provider.
This Customer wants a real GUI look and feel to the migrated application.
I have been asked to create a few dialogs to demo to the Customer.
It would be useful if we could provide a utility (or a wizard ???) to read a MAP source code, and then save it as a DIALOG source code. I know that this would be only a ‘starting point’ (because business logic should be encapsulated in the Dialog in an event-driven way) but at least the basic screen layout + field positionings could be automated.
Kind regards,
Peter.
“Converting” a Map to a Dialog would accomplish very little. Maps have an entire screen as a “unit” of work. You display a screen; the user tabs around entering data, then hits enter or a PF key. By contrast, Dialogs have a unit of work as small as a key stroke. Thus the entire manner in which you interface with the user can be different.
When Natural 2 came out many years ago, many shops claimed they had converted to Natural 2, when in reality what they had done was re-stow their existing code. They did not have Version 2 code. They had Version 1 code re-stowed under Version 2.
Do not fall into the same trap. Re-design your interface to take advantage of all that Dialogs offer.
steve
The crux of Peter’s request lies here,
“We have a Customer, who is downsizing + modernising an application.
They are going to Tender for a solution provider.
This Customer wants a real GUI look and feel to the migrated application.
I have been asked to create a few dialogs to demo to the Customer.”
Sounds familiar to me. I have seen a very solid application in ADABAS Natural lose to a competitor with DB2 and COBOL with a flashy interface that did not deliver the basics when implemented. Now that they have implemented it they are struggling to get it right at any cost.
SAG should provide ‘quick and dirty’ methods just to win over the compettion then do it right. Example grab a program or map and transform for windows and web look alike through a utility - the utility can transform all PFKeys to Menu options.
Feroz Imtiaz