I’m back
Posted: October 17, 2008 Filed under: Don Yantzi, IBM i, RDi, RSE, RSE Book, WDSC 4 Comments »My blogging sebatical is over (hopefully). At any given time I usually have at least 4 or 5 things I want to write about, so coming up with things wasn’t the issue; it was time and priorities. So I’m going to make blogging a higher priority. And with the RSE book finally out and the next release of Rational Developer for i (RDi 7.5) wrapping up, I should have some more time. More on RDi 7.5 in another post.
Interesting, I just went to the MC Press website to lookup the URL for the book and saw an ad for the book saying something about a free chapter download (news to me!) So, if you click on the “Look Inside” link you can download chapter 4 “Workbench Basics”. For those that have been using WDSC or RDi for awhile there might not be a lot new in this chapter for you, but hopefully you pickup a few new tidbits. You can also take a peek at the TOC and index.
If you happen to be at Paul, Skip, Susan, and Jon’s RPG & DB2 Summit next weekthen you can also stop by the MC Press booth and take a look (Merrikay will have some copies there.)
Updated Nov 11th: The link for RDi 7.5 was an internal IBM link that worked fine for me, but likely nobody else :) I’ve changed this to the external announcement letter.
Moving around in LPEX
Posted: March 24, 2008 Filed under: Don Yantzi, i5/OS, IBM, RDi, Remote Systems LPEX Editor, RSE, RSE Book 7 Comments »So I originally intended to keep blogging as I was working on the RSE book, but as it turns out, writing a book is a lot of work (who knew?) So things like blogging, exercise, and other hobbies got put on hold for awhile. The manuscript is due to MC Press next week so hopefully blogging and exercise can make a come back.
I’m currently reviewing Nazmin’s editor chapters and came across a section called “Moving the Curosr”. My initial thought was “this seems kind of obvious, perhaps we should just delete this section”. But to my surprise I learned three new ways to navigate around LPEX from reading it and I added one that Nazmin didn’t know about.
I suspect that a lot of users don’t know all of the ways, or perhaps they use them in a Web browser but don’t realize they can also be used in LPEX. So we decided to leave this section :) It’s pretty short anyways. And don’t worry, there are lots more exciting sections with cool stuff like the outline view, content assist, and of course keyboard shortcuts in LPEX.
And just so you don’t have to wait, here is the list:
- Press the Up, Down, Left, or Right arrows.
- Press Home to move the cursor to the beginning of a line and End to move it to the end of a line.
- Press Ctrl + Left arrow to move the cursor one word left, or Ctrl + Right ar-row to move it one word right.
- Press Page Up or Page Down to move the cursor up or down one window at a time.
- Press Ctrl + Up arrow to scroll the editor up one line without changing the current line, or Ctrl + Down arrow to scroll the editor down one line.
- Press Ctrl + Home to move the cursor to the beginning of the document, or Ctrl + End to move it to the end of the document.
- Press Ctrl + J to return the cursor to the place in the editor where you last entered text.
- Press Home and then Shift + Tab to position the cursor in the Prefix area.
For those existing RSE users out there, I’d be interested if any of these are new to you. I wasn’t aware of the Ctrl + J shortcut, Ctrl + Left | Right arrows, or Shift + Tab to jump into the prefix area. Good thing Nazmin wrote this chapter!
A Lot of Stuff
Posted: January 17, 2008 Filed under: Don Yantzi, Remote Systems LPEX Editor, RSE, RSE Book, Tips, WDSC 1 Comment »I’m currently running some old testcases for the editor and I came across one that included these steps (while editing CMD source):
- Position your cursor at “(” and press Ctrl + Shift + M
- Cursor should reposition to the matching “)”
I knew we had a match function, but I had no idea it would match brackets too! So I had to try it with RPG and sure enough it works there too! Bottom line: there are a lot of features in the RSE, epecially the Remote Systems LPEX Editor. I’m really looking forward to reading the editing chapter that Nazmin is currently work on to see what else I’ve been missing out on : )
As for my progress on the book, I just finished up my big chapter which basically covers the Remote Systems view (connections, filters, working with libraries, objects and members, iSeries table view (which perhaps should be a separate chapter, but is closely related to the other stuff), and filter pools. I resisted putting a section on profiles, but the more I think about it the more I’m inclined to include one. Probably in a different “miscellaneous stuff” chapter. Now I’m onto the iSeries projects chapter.
The RSE Book
Posted: December 18, 2007 Filed under: Don Yantzi, Remote Systems LPEX Editor, RSE, RSE Book, System i, WDSC 9 Comments »It’s official. Nazmin and I have a publishing agreement with MC Press to write a book on the RSE. We sent in two chapters (Getting Started and the Debugger) back in October and they liked them so they gave us the green light to go full steam ahead. We are scheduled to deliver the first manuscript to MC Press in 1Q 2008 and the book should be out around 4 months after that.
The book will be dedicated entirely to the RSE, integrated iSeries debugger and iSeries projects. The goal is to provide detailed descriptions of the features, how they were intended to be used, how this differs from how they are actually being used, customizations, how to map how things are done in SEU / PDM to the RSE, lots of tips, techniques and screenshots. And of course, some of the deep technical information that the RSE power users out there have been waiting for :)
Nazmin is currently working on the editor chapter and I’m working on the “Accessing libraries, object, and members” chapter. My chapter will basically cover the Remote Systems view (connections, managing LIBL, filters, filter pools, iSeries table view, running commands).
The problem so far has been too much writing. All the chapters are blowing their original size estimates. It seems there’s lots to write about once you dig into it.
I’m planning to do a lot more blogging here while writing the book, to share some tips, thoughts, updates on the progress, and to get feedback. In fact this has been the impetus behind quite a few of my recent postings. I would be doing some writing and want to share it immediately.
We would love any feedback, suggestions or comments you have for the book. Feel free to post a comment here or send us an email.
