Stepping up to LANSA Version 11

Step 2 - Switch some or all development over to use the Visual LANSA IDE

When:      Optional - at your leisure.
Benefits gained:
The most important things about this step that managers or planners need to know:
The most important things about this step that application developers need to know:

More productive application development.

The Visual LANSA development workbench (IDE) has been completely replaced in LANSA V11. Producing 5250, Web or Windows applications is now easier and faster than before. Developers using this workbench are demonstrably more productive than those using 5250 screens for development.

You need to plan for this step.

Here are some guidelines and suggestions for planning to switch development to the Visual LANSA IDE:

Check Choose and implement a Task Tracking scenario

Task tracking assumes greater significance when teams of developers are using the Visual LANSA IDE. For example, when you were developing in the iSeries 5250 development environment, all your developers were using a single repository and issues such as two developers editing the same function simultaneously could not arise.

LANSA's Task Tracking facilities are designed to:
  • Track the application changes that developers make
  • Prevent developers from accidentally interfering with each others work
Before switching development to the Visual LANSA IDE, you should choose and implement a task tracking scenario. Even if you already use task tracking in the 5250 development environment, you may wish to review the options because different considerations apply to the Visual LANSA development environment.

Visit the install planner to choose and implement a task tracking scenario.
Check Complete Visual LANSA IDE familiarisation and training

Once you are ready to get started, you and your developers will need to do some reading and some tutorials in order to familiarize yourselves with the power of your new IDE. Refer to "You need to learn some new concepts to get the best from the new generation Visual LANSA IDE" for some suggestions to accomplish this.
Check Choose and implement a development scenario

Designing and installing an application development environment that involves multiple developers using multiple hardware and software platforms and supporting a full range of application development and deployment options can prove to be a complex and time-consuming task.

For this reason, we have prepared a limited set of scenarios that represent the requirements of the majority of implementations. Using one of these scenarios simplifies the planning and implementation by providing just a few standardized and proven choices.

Visit the install planner to choose and implement a scenario for your development environment.
Check Configure repository and work groups for repository synchronisation

You need to configure and maintain repository and (optionally) work groups. This will enable repository synchronization that will ensure that all developers have the latest version of repository objects as they are checked-in by other developers.

When you choose a development environment scenario, the associated instructions include the steps for establishing repository groups to enable repository synchronisation.

You need to learn some new concepts to get the best from the new generation Visual LANSA IDE.

If you are presently a LANSA Developer working in the LANSA for iSeries (5250) developer environment then you will probably find working in the new Visual LANSA IDE a revelation. From simple things like the amount of source code you can see at one time and basic Windows cut, copy and paste operations through to advanced productivity features that dramatically reduce the code, compile and debug development cycle, there is plenty to like about doing LANSA development in the Visual LANSA IDE.

Refer to Top 5 Reasons for a 5250 Developer to switch to using the Visual LANSA Integrated Development Environment (PDF 849KB) for a description of the many, many ways in which using the Visual LANSA IDE will make your work smoother, faster and more fun.

Once you are ready to get started, you will need to do some reading and some tutorials in order to familiarize yourself with the power of your new IDE. It would be a good idea to ask your LANSA account manager about suitable classroom training. Find out more about LANSA Education.

Refer to the Visual LANSA User Guide, and especially the tutorials contained in it for comprehensive information on using the Visual LANSA IDE.

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