RDi Lite, RDi Premium

Closing this request is one of the reasons why you can not find programmers under 40 and in long term will mean the desappear of System-i in midrange customers in Italy.

IBM - please reopen and consider the request to ensure RDi can be lite and have an extended reach to the developer community.
Given the necessity to pull more developers - we need to get moving in the direction, just as IBM had invested in open source or acquisition of Red HAT Linux.
The lite version will pull more crowds and ensure things get moving ahead for the developer community in terms of learning & productivity.

Dear IBM, along with the others, I urge you to re-consider offering an RDI Lite version. As a consultant getting back into Sys i work, I find RDi to be a must for working on this platform. I know that as an IT Manager, I struggled to get approval for the individual licenses at the Premium price points. Making RDi more available can only enhance IBM's prospects with their platform for the future. Respectfully, William S Zimmerman.

IBM, please reopen and reconsider this community request. Development to many of us is our bread and butter and the way companies expect their developers to pay for their own education today, we need IBM to come to the party just as Microsoft has, to make it easier for the majority of us to be able to continue development and support for this great operating system

Our company is considering to leave the platform for issues like this.
Regards
David

Delivered: This request has been delivered into a previously released version of the product, or imminently in the next available release.

IBM, please honour the user's RFE with correct status and explain as how it has been claimed as Delivered.

Any free version of the RDi will no doubt bring more people to RPG and to its the more recent features. I agree that the price of the RDi discourages companies to invest in the formation of their staff. Not having that free version make many developers give up the adoption of better programming skills.

IBM seem not to understand that they have a vested interest in making the adoption of RPG as easy as possible. Putting adoption behind a paywall puts smaller companies off using RDi, thus reducing the ease of development and putting their developers at a disadvantage in the industry, which in turn leads to fewer developers in the IBM i arena.

Making a Lite version available free of charge to ALL IBM i shops would dramatically increase the adoption of the latest RPG features, which I believe would eventually lead to an increase in the number of RPG developers, which would also drive further development of existing systems, while also reducing the rate of attrition of IBM i shops around the world.

What happened the status says Delivered but there isn't a free version of RDi available?

The "delivered" status is fake, and prevents people from voting. Intentional side-effect?

A Lite version of RDi would be very helpful in driving the advancement of our developers. Our company has paid the price so this post is not selfish in intent. Thinking about the larger IBMi community. The current pricing model is a barrier to entry and we don't need yet another barrier to IBMi development. Meaning, it is difficult enough to convince management to keep the IBMi. We have lost hundreds (thousands?) of small businesses for that very reason. We need help in making these tools more affordable. And, by the way, we still pay for PDM and SEU even though updates are discontinued! IBM basically discontinued the products but still require them to be present for RDi, then left us with a requirement to purchase another product! This request seems reasonable.

Well, a paid version with 120 days evaluation period can not really be considered as delivered, compared to the demand!
A lite version with basic functionality as mentioned in other posts, remarks would help developers to deliver state of the art software, built with state of the art, modern tools.
In my opinion it would be in the interest of IBM to deliver this asap. This would not only help the huge community, but could also be seen as a rectification for the lost credits of this wonderful and reliable system and language, that IBM lost in the past through bad marketing.

Pls consider this again and give us, what we need most for the benefit of all: IBM, developers, community, users

thanks and rgds
Michael

I have been teaching IBM topics to young and seasoned developers for over 20 years. Helping people learn RDi and enticing seasoned developers to not only learn new RPG programming techniques but also a new IDE takes time.

IBM needs to reconsider making a RDi Lite version of the product available to help developers make the transition to using RDi. Ultimately this will lead to a larger acceptance of the product and sales... thanks!
Jim Buck

I do agree with those who claim that Delivered status was given here prematurely. The requestor was asking for RDi Lite with basic functionality that would come with operating system with no extra charge, and it's hard to see how that is currently "delivered".

RFE closed incorrectly. The request was to provide a "lite" or basic version that was free to use.

Disappointed in the outcome (or lack of thereof). Entry barriers such as upfront costs for basic but efficient application development toolset help further shrink the IBM i ecosystem and limit the innovation coming from the new developers, SMBs and cross platform teams. I suggest looking at Microsoft as an example of keeping the community expanding and energized with a set of very capable free tools. Please reconsider.

What has been "delivered" is not a free, limited version of RDi. I ask IBM to reconsider this request.

As a long-standing and extremely fanatical member of the IBM i platform and more specifically the RPG language, I am saddened and disappointed at what appears to be happening to this platform.

I have always been a RPG/IBM solutions developer and have always been excited to adapt to the new and wonderful functionality that IBM has added to the operating system in a continuous stream throughout my career that goes back to the System/32 (40 – 45 years) until the present time.
In all this time the one thing which has been clear is that IBM has ALWAYS provided the best editing tools available to allow the RPG/ILE developer world, free of charge, to be able to access all the functionality provided by the OS.

Until now.

The latest developments, in the RPGILE environment, that of fully-free RPGILE is not supported by PDM and requires RDi 9.6 to utilize it to the best and most efficient advantage.

However IBM in their “wisdom” has decided to charge for this editor at a level that many of the small to medium companies either cannot justify or cannot afford, which includes myself. This leaves the major proportion of the RPGILE development community stalled or in limbo, not being able to utilize the newer functionality available or having to struggle with older editors which don't support the syntax.
I fear that this might just be another nail in the IBM i coffin, but what is really most disconcerting is that IBM themselves are the ones holding the hammer.

Very disappointed in the decision to close this request, with a false status of "Delivered". All industry heavyweights endorsed it, and even COMMON Europe did.

Dear IBM, I have worked on, developed with, and championed the IBM i for the best part of 20 years. I have given tuition on, and brought my colleagues into using the WDSC client. But all the time the question is why is there no free RDi tool supported by IBM? Why are we scratching around for an install so we can shine and show this system for what it is?
Instead we remain in a black and green screen fixed box whilst other development platforms flourish. We look like dinosaurs because we're using prehistoric technology... and IBM has to take some of the blame for this.

The platform is diminishing because of lack of vision and poor PR. The strongest asset the IBM i has is it's community, it's current user base, in particular the developers. I am one of them yet for the past 5 years I have been distancing myself from the platform and quieting my cheers for the system I have loved.

This is a last ditch call for something back. A lite version of RDi for the bread and butter coders.

Thanks and sincere regards
C. Rickards

I support an open RDI. With the cost cutting globally going on..Companies are not willing if not hesitant to invest in expensive tools despite the persistent push and support from native ibmi developers along with the constant effort to modernize applications so that it will remain relevant to this date. Having a limited tool to push modernization will eventually end up massive exodus as open source community is becoming bigger and bigger and more accessible. An alternate solution is always available to replace a legacy solution. Hence, beating the competition is always staying relevant.