My take on "Why does SMAPI exist" is shaped by experience with i/OS + JT400 / JTOpen.
JTOpen offers pretty complete programmatic operations access to the i/Series. IBM was enthusiastic enough to provide an overly-complete-to-the-point-of-bloating Java client API for the TCP/IP services that provide the host side of the access. So on discovering SMAPI, and finding that, in this instance, IBM omitted to write the Java client, I wrote the Java client. That is PigIron (http://pigiron.sourceforge.net) Then a friend says, "People will want to use this in web applications." So I wrote PigLet, the servlet that accepts requests formatted in JSON (a popular browser-to-webserver data interchange format http://json.org) and delivers PigIron functionality, i.e., SMAPI, returning the results in JSON to the web app. Then the friend says, "Well, actually, what people will want is an intelligent navigator so VM newbies can do admin chores from drag-and-drop." So now I'm starting work on PigView. Incidentally, the fun thing about SMAPI vs. JTOpen is that the VM sysprog can easily extend SMAPI, whereas the i/OS programmer can't (easily) extend the server side of JTOpen. VM, creaking under the weight of years as it is, still remains the coolest OS IBM supports. -- Jack J. Woehr # I run for public office from time to time. It's like http://www.well.com/~jax # working out at the gym, you sweat a lot, don't get http://www.softwoehr.com # anywhere, and you fall asleep easily afterwards. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For LINUX-390 subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@vm.marist.edu with the message: INFO LINUX-390 or visit http://www.marist.edu/htbin/wlvindex?LINUX-390
