AS400 Interface - Beta Version 1.01

Introduction

Whilst looking for a PC to AS400 interface that we could use in Delphi we evaluated three 'off-the-shelf' products, two of which accessed the AS400 via the PC support DLL's and one that used an ODBC interface.

We found that the ODBC interface was too slow for our requirements, and the two DLL interfaces were not able to meet our requirements.

The solution was to write our own in-house interface which is completely native to Delphi.  We created four Delphi components:

AS400RemoteCommand	This allows any valid remote command to be submitted to
			the AS400.

AS400DirectTransfer	This allows data to be read from or written to the AS400, it is
			fully complient with the IBM PC support SQL interface and 
			provides optimum performance.

AS400DataAwareGrid	This is a local tool that enables data to be automatically loaded 
			and formatted directly into a grid.  The reasoning behind this
			component is that when accessing data from the AS400 you
			will either interperet each line as it arrives, place it directly in
			a local PC based file, or want to load all the data into memory.
			The Delphi string grid is the only component that allows large
			amounts of data to be stored in memory.  Therefore we created
			this hybrid string grid which will load an entire library member
			and format it using the AS400 field names and data sizes.

AS400FileTransfer	This is another local tool that will receive data from the AS400
			and create a local file that can then be accessed as a normal
			text file.

The above components are avaliable either on a one-off or per site basis.  For evaluation purposes only you may use the enclosed components.  If you require any further information or wish to evaluate or purchase any of the above components then please contact us through our Compuserve address 100347,443.

Liability

To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, Gerald Limited shall not be liable for any damages whatsoever (including, without limitation, damages for loss of business profits, business interruption, loss of business information, or other loss) arising out of the use or miuse of this product.  This product will be used in the full knowledge that it is a beta test version, and it is the responsibility of those reading this liability notice to ensure that nobody uses this product without full knowledge of this liability notice.

Trademarks

All trademarks are acknowledged

Copyright

This product is copyright Gerald Limited - all rights reserved.



System Requirements

The system requires PC support and all associated DLL's are present on your system (usually in the windows system directory), and a copy of Borlands Delphi is installed on your system.  A valid PC support connection is required prior to
activating any of the components.

Correspondence

All correspondence is to be sent via our Compuserve address 100347,443, our postal address is:

Gerald Limited
Systems Department
Europe House
World Trade Centre
London
England
E1 9AA

Test Platforms

This product has been tested on PC Support version 2.3, EICON LAN Router/400, Novell  SAA400 Version 1.3b, and OS/400 V3.05.

The Beta Test Package

Due to the demand for our first beta release of the Remote Command interface we have taken the steps of now supplying the
three other components for beta release.