1. Profound.js: The future of open source development on IBM i
Agile Modernization with Profound.js
Alex Roytman
CEO
Profound Logic
Liam Allan
Product Developer
Profound Logic

2. 3 Different Levels of Application Modernization
User Interface
Application Code / Business Logic
Database

3. User Interface Modernization
Approaches are:
Put something on top of 5250
Replace Green-Screen DDS with a Web or Mobile Interface
HTML5
CSS
JavaScript
JSON
PHP / .NET / Java / Node.js are not user interface technologies

4. Bad reasons to modernize RPG backend
Our Java / .NET / PHP team already knows UI programming
Assumption that RPG is old and therefore not good at database-driven business applications
Misconception that RPG can not output a Web/Mobile Interface

5. Great reasons to modernize backend RPG
Open up codebase to a larger pool of developers
Take advantage of Open Source
New capabilities
Cloud
Web Services
IoT
Watson
Modularization

6. The options Free Format ILE RPG Modernize progressively
Chances of failure low
Limited resources
Staffing
Education
Examples
Creates silos
Intrusive
Prone to failure
More resources available
Modernize progressively
Chances of failure low
Abundance of resources
Staffing
Open source components
Examples, etc.

7. Why Node.js? Proven Enterprise-ready Examples: Walmart eBay Netflix
Liam starts here

8. Why Node.js? More developers than any other language It’s exploding
Open Source Community
Millions of developers
IBM, Google, and other Giants

9. Performance Why Node.js? Performs and scales better Event loop
Non-blocking I/O
Event driven
Clusterable
Performance

10. Why Node.js? Portable Any platform Including IBM i
Including client-side

11. Why Node.js? JavaScript is already used on client-side Extensible
Single language for entire stack
Node.js is just server-side JavaScript
Extensible
NPM
Can be made to work like ILE
Allows for Agile Modernization

12. Node.js Start out with a blank slate
Bring in packages depending on needs
Built to be adoptable / extensible
Not only can you port it to IBM i
Can be extended to work with and act like RPG
Can allow for Agile Modernization

14. Extending Node with Profound.js
Top-down business programming
Add stateful capabilities: ExFmt style of coding
Provide both SQL and Record Level Access
With support for db overrides, QTEMP, library lists, sessions, etc.
Support both strongly and loosely typed fields
All IBM i data types, data structures, parameters, etc.
Call and be called like an IBM i program (with parameters) by CL/RPG
Even when the CL or RPG has interfaces
Liam ends here

15. New Application / Package
Agile Modernization
Legacy Application
New Application / Package
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG

16. New Application / Package
Agile Modernization
Legacy Application
New Application / Package
Java
.NET
PHP
PHP
Java
Java
.NET
.NET
.NET
PHP
Java
PHP
Java

17. Agile Modernization Your Application RPG RPG RPG RPG RPG RPG RPG RPG

18. Agile Modernization Your Application Node.js RPG RPG RPG RPG RPG RPG

19. Agile Modernization Your Application Node.js Node.js Node.js Node.js
RPG
RPG
Node.js
Node.js
Node.js
Node.js
RPG
Node.js
Node.js
RPG
RPG
RPG
RPG

20. NPM – Node Package Manager
Part of Node.js (not installed separately)
Uses a public registry of packages
Package is just a directory of code
Package.json has metadata about the package
Packages depend on each other
Packages are small

21. Using NPM Npm init Npm install <package>
Npm install <package> --save
Npm publish
Npmjs.com to browse for packages

22. NPM Demo

23. Using Node Node <script to do something>
Node <script to launch server>
Packages are brought in using the require() statement

24. Node Demo
Liam ends here

25. Event loop Allows for high throughput in Node.js
Allows Node to be single threaded while still allowing multiple operations to be handled in the background
Blocking the event loop is bad
Forces the use of event driven programming
I/O operations require a callback

26. Top-down Transactional / Business Programming
Read Data
Process Data
Present Output to User
Get and Process User Feedback
Update Data

27. What is callback hell?
The messy code you sometimes end up with when trying to code callbacks
A new function is called when an I/O operation concludes
That function is passed in as a parameter
Can be named
But can also be anonymous

28. What we are forced to do

29. What we might want to be able to do

30. NPM to the rescue A number of “callback hell” solutions are available
Fibers is one popular solution
Ported to IBM i by Profound Logic
Once implemented in your project, code can be written top-down
Event loop is not blocked
Waiting for the callback to fire happens inside the implementation
Developer doesn’t have to worry about it

31. Extending Node.js to be like ILE

32. Strongly Typed Fields and Calls

33. RPG to Node.js Demo

34. Questions & Answers Our Web Site: www.profoundlogic.com
Profound.js Microsite: Contact me:
profoundlogic
company/profound-logic-software
@ProfoundLogic