After many years, the advantages become clear.

Thousands of active Synon, or CA-2E, applications are still under maintenance around the world. The 4GL had a surge in the late '80s and early '90s, but like so many such tools on all platforms, it had its detractors.

Long-Term Payoff

Most owners of legacy RPG applications on the IBM i struggle with how to comprehend their sprawling code and create a strategy for what, if anything, can be done to migrate it. These applications are full of proven business logic representing sizable investments for their owners, and it's a shame to not get the maximum return from that.

Synon, however, enforced a structured, model-driven approach from its inception. The result today is that Synon application logic is completely recoverable and reusable.

Viewing the Model

Fulfilling the vision of reusability is Databorough's X-2E product, which presents a modern face for an old-school programming tool. With interactive graphics and drill-down for the data model, developers can easily point and click their way through all the data relationships in the Synon model.

It's in the business logic that X-2E really comes through and puts a modern face on Synon applications. With a complete, cross-referenced inventory of business rules, X-2E gives developers a modern view of the application through the perspective of business processes and business rules.

Also boosting business logic visibility is the graphical display of Action Diagrams, again with cross-reference and drill-down capabilities.

Reusing Years of Code: Big-Time Value Recovery

With complete, graphical, hyperlinked access to the data model, business rules, action diagrams, internal routines, functions, and all the components of a typical Synon application, X-2E users have options that other IBM i application owners can only dream about.

Legacy application owners typically have three paths when the time comes to move on:

• Rewrite the application
• Migrate the application
• Purchase a package

In all cases, recovering the existing data model and business rules of the legacy application plays a pivotal role in the success of the project. Reusing that information adds and preserves large chunks of IT value. Let's look at each in more detail.

Rewriting or Regenerating Applications

The data model and business rules in your application are, in the largest sense, independent of your application. They are mostly the same whether your business runs on RPG, COBOL, Java, or C#.

When you decide to move to a new application, those business rules and data relationships don't go away; they mostly remain the same and you mostly recode them in the new language.

What better way to inventory the rules and relationships you need than to simply query your existing application? This will save you thousands of hours and mistakes. Using a tool such as X-2E takes you there in one quick and easy step.

Migrating Applications

Here's another key advantage that Synon users have: because their applications are already architected in a modern paradigm, they can be readily converted directly to other languages and platforms. Using the X-2E Migrate module, developers can easily migrate Synon applications to a variety of mix-and-match languages:

Rather than converting the Synon-generated RPG code, the X-2E Migrate module accomplishes these migrations by directly reusing the model, thus preserving the core intelligence and design that has been built into your application over many years.

Purchasing a Package

By using X-2E, Synon users have an important advantage when purchasing off-the-shelf software. The crucial challenge of purchasing a package is to evaluate its suitability. A large part of this evaluation is a "gap analysis," which is intended to reveal gaps in functionality and data between what is required by the business and what the new package offers.

Executing a gap analysis is premised on understanding the requirements of the business, and many of those requirements are embodied in the existing application used by the business. Extracting the functionality and data model of legacy software is challenging, and X-2E again delivers the business rules and data model quickly and easily, thereby expediting the gap analysis process and creating confidence in the thoroughness and accuracy of the process.

For more information about Databorough's X-2E product line, visit the X-2E product page.

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Steve Kilner is a leading expert in the field of static analysis, software complexity metrics, and program comprehension. He is a specialist in the maintenance and migration of legacy software systems for the IBM i and has written extensively on the subject. As the founder of and current CEO of vLegaci, he developed a combination static and dynamic analysis tool for RPG. He currently leverages his experience through his partnership with Databorough, makers of X-Analysis.