01 - Programming (EN)

Fixed RPG to RPG Free conversion (Power-Coffee nr. 31 by Marco Riva)

Last Updated on 20 November 2021 by Roberto De Pedrini

Many of you probably know the Power-Coffee … of our blogger and IBM Champion Marco Riva … a weekly appointment with absolutely interesting technical pills from the IBM i world.

In the episode of November 15, 2021, Power Coffee number 31, Marco presents us some free tools for the RPG conversion from Fixed to Free, coming to recommend a real conversion flow to obtain a better result.

Anyone using Rational Rdi will have already used the product’s native Fixed-Free conversion option … which does a decent job with the program’s “C” specs and sadly, nothing with the HFD and O specs. In Power Coffee we see instead with Marco:

Excellent guide and excellent advice for converting RPG Fixed programs, perhaps even starting from RPG / 400 sources.

RPGFREEWEB By Liam Allan

I add to the list of tools recommended by Marco Riva, also this excellent service, based on the homonymous project GitHub RPGFREEWEB by Liam Allan (thanks for existing Liam!) … a Web App where you can copy and paste the Fixed source to recover the Free one:

http://rpgfreeweb.herokuapp.com/

http://rpgfreeweb.herokuapp.com/

Personally I use this Liam tool … I find it very convenient to open the source in Rational Rdi, ctr-a copy everything …. ctrl-v paste it into RGPFREEWEB and then do the reverse with the converted code (and maybe work on it a bit from Rdi).

This project is also Open Source and we can help improve the conversion or handling of particular cases that we find in our sources … creating value also for those who will use it in the future:

https://github.com/worksofbarry/rpgfreeweb.git

File: Octicons-mark-github.svg - Wikipedia

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--- Roberto De Pedrini Faq400.com
About author

Founder of Faq400 Srl, IBM Champion, creator of Faq400.com and blog.faq400.com web sites. RPG developer since I was wearing shorts, strong IBM i supporter, I have always tried to share my knowledge with others through forums, events and courses. Now, with my company Faq400 Srl, I help companies to make the most of this great platform IBM i.

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