Can your business survive when your RPG programmers retire?

To fully appreciate the dilemma facing IBM i decision makers today, it helps to have an overview of the history of IBM's RPG computer language and its midrange hardware. You might be surprised to learn that IBM's midrange RPG platform has roots back to the late 50s.

You need reliable and solid input about your IBM i RPG application to make effective decisions about it. Unfortunately, those who know the most about the application can’t always be counted on to provide you with the most critical, effective input.

Any decision you make about the future of your IBM i’s RPG application requires the willful cooperation and help of both your RPG and PC programming teams. Start now integrating these teams to lay the groundwork for cooperation and support.

As you consider options for replacing your IBM i RPG software, rewriting that RPG application is an obvious alternative. We urge you to give this option very serious consideration before you jump into it.

IBM is doing a great job with new technologies to persist the IBM i. Alas, it isn't doing much to persist existing RPG applications into the future. IBM leaves it to you to ensure that your RPG applications, and your business, can persist without RPG programmers.

Making decisions about your mission critical RPG applications is exceedingly challenging. Those who commit to making these decisions before crisis-mode sets in will be far better off than those who wait until the last minute.