I'm currently in a very "traditional" and small IBM i/IT shop (6 person crew). While its been bitter-sweet to have some of our IT staff for 30+ years, they will soon be leaving the workforce for retirement, etc; thus my responsibilities will be more focused on the IBM i. We still rely heavily on Query/400 for report generation. With a prior/strong SQL background, I find Query/400 to be painful and limiting; often avoiding it. Our company (as a whole) is slowly shifting to where employees are wanting data/reports beyond a green bar print out; but some of our staff have trouble seeing past a green screen/printed reports. I store my queries in .sql files on the IFS (via RDI). The majority of these manual queries require some sort of modifications when the data/report is updated. I will typically create an SQLRPGLE program, if scheduled runs or automation is needed.
Due to issues, I have not pushed this question internally; but moving forward, I know there has to be a better way to manage queries/reports, etc. The two of us that use SQL share the knowledge/files, but even with a good file structure and naming conventions, there is sometimes struggle to find or recall the right file (similar problem to finding the right query with query/400). I've partly looked at Web Query for i, but there seems to be a lot of negative feedback regarding the product and pricing. There are some other products that I've used in the past, but require additional non-IBM servers; I would really like to keep everything on the IBM i. I have considered looking at a web-based reporting/dashboard engine that could run on top of Zend, that could design the reports or filter saved queries; allowing the users to run/export on demand. I've also thought it might even be possible to write a modular RPG program the individual queries are stored in unique modules, and one module would be used to puke the report or export the data to PDF/CSV/XLS, etc. I'm not sure if that's possible but about to explore that option.
That being said, I know others have went down this route. If you have any recommendations or guidance on what to do or NOT do, I (and probably others) would like to listen.
Thanks,
JA
Due to issues, I have not pushed this question internally; but moving forward, I know there has to be a better way to manage queries/reports, etc. The two of us that use SQL share the knowledge/files, but even with a good file structure and naming conventions, there is sometimes struggle to find or recall the right file (similar problem to finding the right query with query/400). I've partly looked at Web Query for i, but there seems to be a lot of negative feedback regarding the product and pricing. There are some other products that I've used in the past, but require additional non-IBM servers; I would really like to keep everything on the IBM i. I have considered looking at a web-based reporting/dashboard engine that could run on top of Zend, that could design the reports or filter saved queries; allowing the users to run/export on demand. I've also thought it might even be possible to write a modular RPG program the individual queries are stored in unique modules, and one module would be used to puke the report or export the data to PDF/CSV/XLS, etc. I'm not sure if that's possible but about to explore that option.
That being said, I know others have went down this route. If you have any recommendations or guidance on what to do or NOT do, I (and probably others) would like to listen.
Thanks,
JA
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