Screenscrapers didn’t do it. WebFacing couldn’t take them there. If there was an easy way to give its RPG-based ERP suite a fully functional GUI that competed head-to-head with Windows-based ERP vendors, CMS Manufacturing Systems would have found it. Absent a quick-fix converter, the Markham, Ontario, software vendor bit the bullet and this week announced its intention to rewrite more than 10 million lines of RPG IV code to separate core business logic from presentation logic.

The iSeries is well-known as a bullet-proof platform on which to base mission-critical applications, but its native 5250 interface has given it an undeserved

Linoma Software has issued new releases of its graphical database utility and its data transfer software that work better with Microsoft‘s popular operating system and spreadsheet software. Surveyor/400, which puts a graphical face on the DB2/400 database, received new capabilities to import and export DB2/400 data into Excel, while the Transfer Anywhere tool is now supported on the Windows NT operating system.

Transfer Anywhere is a Java-based data-replication program that can handle a range of tasks, including database-to-database conversions, distribution of spool files through e-mail or FTP, and loading data into OS/400’s Integrated File System or another network file

As Apple celebrated the 20th anniversary of its venerable Macintosh computer last week, software developer Celcorp announced it would offer discounts of up to 20 percent on its line of terminal emulation software, which lets Macintosh users access OS/400 and mainframe servers. While Macintosh maintains a paltry minority on the world’s desktop scene, the legion of Mac users is actually growing, and some companies are adopting it anew.

The Celview for Macintosh product line is a mature emulation package that provides Telnet 5250 and 3270 emulation, FTP, and host printing for Macintosh computers. Celview has a long lineage and is

Plasmon last week announced general availability of its new line of iSeries-compatible optical libraries, which sets the stage for bringing ultra density optical (UDO) technology to the platform later this year. Plasmon’s 5.25-inch G-Series optical libraries currently feature magneto optical drives, but with the next release of OS/400, these G-Series libraries will also support new UDO drives, which promise higher capacities and lower costs for companies trying to meet strict “write once” archiving requirements.

UDO is being heralded as the successor to 5.25-inch magneto-optical technology, which had set the standard for long-term storage and archiving for years. With 30 GB