What is XGEN (on the A-series)?

[Richard Steiner]

I've seen several ads here in the Twin Cities for COBOL, DMS II, and
XGEN experience on A-series hardware, and apparently XGEN is a hard
requirement (my COBOL and DMS experience on the 2200 doesn't seem to
mean a thing to these folks).

I have a few basic questions:

What exactly is XGEN?

Where could someone like me (currently unemployed) learn about it?

Thanks in advance for any info...

--
-Rich Steiner >>>---> http://www.visi.com/~rsteiner >>>---> Eden Prairie, MN
OS/2 + BeOS + Linux + Win95 + DOS + PC/GEOS = PC Hobbyist Heaven! :-)
Applications analyst/designer/developer (13 yrs) seeking employment.
See web site in my signature for current resume and background.

[William Q. Graham]

Richard Steiner wrote:

I've seen several ads here in the Twin Cities for COBOL, DMS II, and
XGEN experience on A-series hardware, and apparently XGEN is a hard
requirement (my COBOL and DMS experience on the 2200 doesn't seem to
mean a thing to these folks).

I have a few basic questions:

  What exactly is XGEN?

  XGEN is a 3rd GL that generates COBOL74. It's been around for a long, long time. I think it was initially developed by Jacksonville Software. It is currently owned / marketed by Modis Solutions. Their web site is at

http://www.modisit.com

but they don't seem to mention XGEN at all there.

   My contact for XGEN info at Modis is Tom Casseaux at (850) 877-7541. (Tom.Ca...@modisit.com)

[JB]

I worked here (NZ) for a bank that used XGEN. They chose XGEN over LINC
because XGEN let them define more of their DDL than LINC did. From what I
saw, it's more of a slick way to write COBOL (4GL only) then a slick way to
write applications (LINC). I stayed in the LINC court myself.

The bank had massive troubles locating staff with XGEN experience, despite
advertising in the whole of Australasia. That might indicate that it's a
skill worth putting on your CV. Or that it's a product doomed due to
under-resourcing, depending on your point of view.

JB

"Richard Steiner" <rste...@visi.com> wrote in message
news:nCki9oHp...@visi.com...

[William Q. Graham]

Hi Richard,

     I e-mailed my contact at Modis and he pointed me to another site with some more information on XGEN:

http://www.openware.com/XGEN32.htm

    If you click on the NEXT link at the bottom of that page you can step through a few more pages of information on XGEN.

    If you need anything more let me know and I'll see what I can find out.

Regards,

     Bill

Full Disclosure:We have a business relationship with Modis.

[Charles M Rader]

"Richard Steiner" <rste...@visi.com> wrote in message
news:nCki9oHp...@visi.com...

> What exactly is XGEN?
>
> Where could someone like me (currently unemployed) learn about it?

Vendor's web site is at www.openware.com, but I didn't notice anything about
training there.

--
Charles Rader
ClearPath NX Technical Services, Eagan Service Center
Unisys Global Outsourcing
Eagan, Minnesota

*** Text contains my personal opinions ***

[Richard Steiner]

Here in comp.sys.unisys,
"JB" <romo...@xxSPAMxxbigfoot.com> spake unto us, saying:

>I worked here (NZ) for a bank that used XGEN. They chose XGEN over LINC
>because XGEN let them define more of their DDL than LINC did. From what I
>saw, it's more of a slick way to write COBOL (4GL only) then a slick way to
>write applications (LINC). I stayed in the LINC court myself.

Thanks. I also got a private e-mail response giving me a pretty good
description.

It sounds like XGEN might be a useful product, but it also seems to be
a fairly well-kept secret outside of the shops which actually use it.

We used a little LINC at NWA, and I also remember it being used in the
Unisys Airline Center in Eagan, but I'd never heard of XGEN until I was
contacted by a headhunter about it.

Anyway, I was given this pointer to a site related to XGEN

http://www.openware.com/XGEN32.htm

which gives a very high-level overview, but that (by itself) isn't all
that useful to me. I've contacted Modis for futher information.

>The bank had massive troubles locating staff with XGEN experience, despite
>advertising in the whole of Australasia. That might indicate that it's a
>skill worth putting on your CV. Or that it's a product doomed due to
>under-resourcing, depending on your point of view.

It's a bit more challenging for a programmer like myself to learn about
it (and obtain the skills that employers are looking for) when there
isn't any information available to the public. :-(

[John Oman]

My name is John Oman. I am directory of technical services for Modis,
division FL028. We were formally Openware and still have a web site
(as you know) with our information there.

The reason we are not on the Modis web site is that we are a small
division in a very large corporation and we sell and market software
and the services that go along with it. The rest of Modis (see
www.modisit.com) does not sell software. We have a customer support
division with a hot line and coming online this month is a bulletin
board. We have Xgen users around the globe.

Anyway, XGEN was created in 1984 on Unisys Mainframe since then and
have migrated it to Unix and windows. It is a 4GL language that
generates COBOL for a target platform. Typically the average generate
will turn 1 line of Xgen into 10 lines of COBOL. You can write a
complex program in less than 100 lines and generate from 5k to 10k of
Cobol. Xgen is very BLOCK oriented and anything that can be done for
the programmer, we do it. You can design screens and write programs
on Windows. The target for the generate could be the Unisys Mainframe
and the 4gl generator will generate Unisys Cobol. You can change the
target to Unix or Win32 and change DMSII to Oracle and we will
generate MicroFocus Cobol with Oracle support. You could then change
the target to IBM MVS and DB2 and it will generate IBM Cobol2. We
have our own MCS that simulates COMS on Unix and Windows. We can also
generate CICS for IBM. We also have a very robust support for the BEA
Tuxedo product.

We also have a Cobol filter that will take Unisys Cobol to MicroFocus
Cobol. It will convert DMSII commands to SQL commands.

The pricing for Xgen is dependent of the "knowledge base" you are
targeting. The knowledge bases are Unisys, Unix, Oracle, Informix,
Sybase, SQLServer, DB2 and IBM MVS. Also depending on the number of
programmers. We use the mainframe pricing model and can be very
expensive for the larger shops.

We do the training usually at the customer site. The main training we
do for Xgen has 3 levels (basic, intermediate and advanced). We also
do customized training for some of the other products.

Our products include Xgen, MCS, KANDI (CANDE emulator for Unix and
Win32), XIDE (Win32 only) and Cobol filter.

John Oman
john...@modisit.com

[lea5...@gmail.com]

Hi Richard, did you find what you were looking for? I am an XGEN programmer and had to learn it from manuals because it wasn't cost justifiable to train 1 software engineer. I can answer XGEN questions for you... however... what our company is doing now - is having me convert XGEN programs back to COBOL. XGEN has some limitations and is no longer doing what we need to have done. I enjoyed the Screen/report/records interfacing - but that's no longer feasible. It's nice to know that there are companies seeking XGEN programmers though! Guess I'm not as much of a dinosaur as I thought.

Lea

[onefu...@yahoo.com]

I am currently on a contract for an organization that uses XGEN on a Unisys MCP mainframe. XGEN is very COBOL-like so a good COBOL programmer can pick it up in a week by looking at existing programs at a customer site. I'm fortunate in that I have the full documentation so if there is something I can't figure out I can find a solution fairly quickly.

I can answer questions too if you have any.

@Lea - Sorry but we are all dinosaurs if we know COBOL or XGEN - :-)

[Scott Lurndal]

lea5...@gmail.com writes:
>Hi Richard, did you find what you were looking for? I am an XGEN progra=
>mmer and had to learn it from manuals because it wasn't cost justifiable to=
> train 1 software engineer. I can answer XGEN questions for you... howeve=
>r... what our company is doing now - is having me convert XGEN programs bac=
>k to COBOL. XGEN has some limitations and is no longer doing what we need=
> to have done. I enjoyed the Screen/report/records interfacing - but that=
>'s no longer feasible. It's nice to know that there are companies seeking=
> XGEN programmers though! Guess I'm not as much of a dinosaur as I thought=
>.=20
>
>Lea=20

Richards post was made 13 years ago. I don't think he waited
around for your reply.

>
>
>On Thursday, September 19, 2002 at 4:30:21 PM UTC-5, Richard Steiner wrote:
>> I've seen several ads here in the Twin Cities for COBOL, DMS II, and
>> XGEN experience on A-series hardware, and apparently XGEN is a hard
>> requirement (my COBOL and DMS experience on the 2200 doesn't seem to
>> mean a thing to these folks).

>>=20

>> I have a few basic questions:

>>=20
>> What exactly is XGEN?
>>=20

>> Where could someone like me (currently unemployed) learn about it?

>>=20

>> Thanks in advance for any info...

>>=20
>> --=20
>> -Rich Steiner >>>---> http://www.visi.com/~rsteiner >>>---> Eden Prairie=
>, MN
>> OS/2 + BeOS + Linux + Win95 + DOS + PC/GEOS =3D PC Hobbyist Heaven! :=

[spue...@gmail.com]

Scott Good morning
Like Richard I've started to work in a company that
You have xGEN and Cobol74 Unisys and working on online program
I get the following error

--> Message Rejected, The Program is Disabled

Thank you, can you guide me how to solve this?

Sergio L Puentes Valladares
Analyst Programmer
Buenos Aires, Argentina

[spue...@gmail.com]

Good morning
Like Richard I've started to work in a company that
You have xGEN and Cobol74 Unisys and working on online program
I get the following error

---> Message Rejected. The Programa is Disabled

[Curt Raddatz]

The 'Program is disabled ' message is coming from COMS the application program manager for Unisys MCP systems. Someone with appropriate permission can use ?ENABLE PROGRAM <program name> to enable it.

Hope this helps,
Curt

[mattj...@gmail.com]

Curt is correct, you will need to run "? ENABLE PROGRAM <program name>" after you have compiled it. You may also need to run the COMS program UTILITY to make sure the transaction is set up correctly before you can ENABLE it. (Your problem really isn't a problem with XGEN rather it is just getting your program to run after you built it.)


Best Regards,

Matt Dean

[spue...@gmail.com]

Thank a lot

[spue...@gmail.com]

Thanks a Lot

[goodo...@gmail.com]

We are still here and supporting/updating our product Xgen. Xgen.net and cloud services. New company name and email:
www.astadia.com
john...@astadia.com