Chapter 1: Developing Applications with Mainframe Express

This chapter describes how you can use Mainframe Express to develop a project that uses mainframe-based files.

Development Procedure

Figure 1-1 shows the typical procedure for developing an application with Mainframe Express.

Figure 1-1: Typical Application Development Procedure

Development Steps

The different steps in the diagram are covered in the following paragraphs:

Download source and data
One of the first steps is making the mainframe-based source and data available to your PCs. You can download all, some or none of the source and data - Mainframe Express can access both source and data files regardless of whether they are on the local PC, a network server or the mainframe.

Although there are a number of tools available to help you move your files to a PC, we recommend Micro Focus Mainframe Access. Mainframe Access intelligently handles the transfers of many different file types, converting between mainframe and PC file formats where appropriate. See your sales representative for more information on Mainframe Access.

Downloading source and data files is usually the role of a Mainframe Express administrator.
Create project
Once you have your files in place, or have set up links to them on the mainframe, you can create a project to define the application you will be working on, using the PC. You use projects to define a wide range of information, including the following:
- The files that make up the project
- Properties that apply to the entire project, such as the system catalog and whether or not the project uses CICS, IMS or SQL
- Properties that apply to files of a specific type. For instance, you can specify that all COBOL source files are compiled using the same dialect of COBOL or that all Assembler files use the same set of directives.
- Properties that apply to individual files so that you can override the defaults for files that need different processing
- Workgrouping properties, which enable you to specify where the project's files are to be located: locally, networked or on the host. You can also use these properties to create a series of libraries through which the source code will be promoted as it is developed.
  For example, you can define that a programmer holds working copies of programs in the testing library on a network server during testing. Then, when they are completely tested, they are promoted to the production library on the host.
Creating a project is usually the role of a Mainframe Express administrator.
Compile, test, debug and edit
Once you have defined a project, you are ready to start the main phase of the development cycle. Mainframe Express's integrated debugger and editor enables you to edit and debug from the same window. If you change a file within a project you can rebuild the modified modules and then start debugging again. When you are happy with the changes that you have made, you can use Mainframe Express's enhanced, testing-specific features (known collectively as TouchPoint) to run both regression and conformance tests on your application.
Upload source
Having debugged and tested your source code, you can upload the changed files to the mainframe using the same tool that you used to download them at step 1.

Uploading source files is usually the role of a Mainframe Express administrator.