The tools the work is done with today

You can still program on IBM i exactly as in 1995, and many do. It works, and it is no crime. But there is a technical fact worth more than any argument: SEU does not understand fully free-form RPG. The integrated editor has been stabilised — it gets fixes, not new function — and the syntax introduced afterwards was never taught to it.

Anyone writing **FREE in SEU sees correct constructs flagged as errors. This is not an opinion about editors: it is why, at some point, you change tool.

The three routes

SEU and PDM. The integrated editor and manager, inside the 5250 session. They remain the only thing available everywhere, with nothing to install, and for a quick fix on a system you have just connected to they are still the fastest route.

RDi — Rational Developer for i. The Eclipse-based environment, an IBM product you pay for. It is complete: an editor that knows the language, a graphical debugger, navigation across sources, integration with compiling. It is the reference tool in established departments.

VS Code with Code for IBM i. The extension that brings development on this platform into the most widely used editor in the world: source members open as though they were files, you compile from the editor, errors appear on the line, and you navigate objects and the database. It is free, it is alive, and it is the route newcomers arrive by today.

What genuinely changes when the tool changes

It is not aesthetics. It is three things that do not exist in a 5250 session.

Searching all the code in a second. Finding every place a field is used, or every program calling a procedure, is something that with the traditional tools takes dedicated commands and patience.

Seeing the error on the line. Compiling with OPTION(*EVENTF), the editor reads the events file and puts errors where they belong, instead of leaving the spooled listing to be consulted separately.

Having the source under git. With sources on the IFS you get branches, history, diffs and review requests as in any other project. It is the point at which development on this platform stops being a world apart in the way the work is done, too.

The rest of the toolbox

ACS — Access Client Solutions. The program you connect with: 5250 emulator, IFS browsing, file transfer, and above all Run SQL Scripts, the environment where queries get written and tried. It runs in Java on any operating system, is free, and has replaced the old Windows client.

Automated build tooling. The gap left by the absence of a project file has been filled by community tools that compile a whole application following its dependencies, and that integrate with git and with continuous integration systems. They are the answer to "how do I rebuild everything in the right order without a hand-written CL".

Package managers. IBM i runs a wide collection of open source software — Python, Node, Git, Bash — installable and updatable as on any Unix system. It is why you can now automate something on the system without writing a CL.

How to start, if you are starting now

The least-friction order, for anyone wanting to change how they work without asking for a project:

1. ACS, to get Run SQL Scripts. On its own it changes how you look at data.
2. VS Code with Code for IBM i, connected to the system. The sources stay where they are.
3. OPTION(*EVENTF) on compiles, to get errors on the right line.
4. A new application with sources on the IFS and under git, to try the full flow where nothing can break.