PigIron / News: Recent posts

The PigIron repo has been migrated to GitHub.
PigIron was later used as a component of Ublu.
I'm working with IBM to make an installable RPM of Ublu and the migration of PigIron to GitHub is part of that strategy.

PigIron has switched to an SVN repository.
Use the SVN button on the toolbar instead of the Code button to reach the live source code.

Intermediate release for developers exploring PigIron now posted. The code is greatly enhanced since the previous release (in 2009!) but the documentation is not totally up to date. Working on this in my Copious Spare Time :)

I have just checked in code that brings Open Object Rexx bindings to PigIron back to life. You'll also need to download BSF4ooRexx to use them. Put ObjectRexx in your path and put the BSF4ooRexx jar (e.g., bsf4ooRexx-v452-20150812-bin.jar) and pigiron.jar in your CLASSPATH and try out the test scripts in pigiron/scripts/oorexx/functest for examples of usage. Of course you will need to check out the latest code and build PigIron, because I have not yet made a new release.... read more

I have resumed work on PigIron. I am updating it to work with IBM z/VM 6.3 SMAPI (trademarks IBM) and hooking it to a yet-unpublished open source language I designed over the past two years and which I plan to publish in 2016. If you want to work with PigIron now in Java be aware of a few things:
1. The PigIron source code is hundreds of hours of work past the last "official" PigIron release
2. The documentation even in the current source code is a little out of date, esp. with regard to arrays
3. I'm not going any further with ObjectRexx bindings since I can't compile ObjectRexx on OpenBSD.
4. I'm not going much further with FIJI bindings though they are currently up-to-date

With release 0.9.5 of PigIron, PigLet, the PigIron Servlet now features the forms-based Builder web application. PigIron provides the client for IBM z/VM SMAPI and PigLet serves that client capability up in JSON to web applications. A sample web application is included. http://pigiron.sourceforge.net

PigIron core is now joined by PigLet, the PigIron servlet. PigIron provides the client for IBM z/VM SMAPI and PigLet serves that client capability up in JSON to web applications. A sample web application is included. http://pigiron.sourceforge.net

I've checked in working code for the PigLet PigIron Servlet that serves up VSMAPI data in JSON format.

PigIron 0.8 is released at http://sourceforge.net/projects/pigiron/

PigIron is a Java class library implementing
the client specification for the IBM z/VM Virtual Machine Operating System
Systems Management Application Programming Interface (sometimes called VSMAPI).

New in 0.8:
* Testing
* Mostly using FIJI ForthIsh Java Interpreter for testing now
* http://fiji.sourceforge.net
* Much more test coverage
* Bugs found and fixed (two or three)
* Discovered and completed incomplete PigGen parameter descriptions
* No actual code bugs discovered!
* Build
* Generate the md5 sums at release time
* Features
* Added a simple TCP asynchronous subscriber to DM notifications
* Return Codes / Reason Codes
* Straightened out the threefoldness of the RetC/ReasC/Function
matrix. Now all messages associated with RCs and reason codes
should be correct.
* SSL Support added
* Needs testing.
* Web Objects
* Clarified JSON model somewhat

PigIron now supports z/VM 5.4 SMAPI.

PigIron now provides a complete ObjectRexx interface to the Java classes based on BSF4Rexx.

VSMAPI on z/VM 5.4 will be supported in PigIron release 0.6.

Also much testing using ObjectRexx scripting will appear in 0.6.

All 100 VSMAPI Functions are now supported in PigIron. This is "about Alpha" level though 0.6 will feature more scripted testing.

All the non-DM functions are now implemented (though not all are tested!).

Beginning of web objects and scripting.

PigGen autogeneration of Java code to implement struct type, array types for PigIron is awesome, at least now that I've worked kinks and bugs (more kink than than bugs) out of the flow.

Completing rest of the core 5.3 VSMAPI function set is becoming data entry.

The core parameter marshalling and transmission system is done. Autogeneration of parameter structs and arrays and of functions works. Adding functions and their complementary parameters. This release is functionally incomplete and documentationally incomplete, but interesting enough in this fast-moving project to warrant a convenience release for early adopters.

Pigiron now has autogeneration of Java code to implement the many VSMAPI structs and arrays used by the functions. It's done by passing spec files through Gnu m4. The implementation is in pigiron/piggen and working spec files are in pigiron/piggen/parmfiles .

The core mechanism (recursive descent parameter marshalling and transmission) works very well. Having implemented 5 VSMAPI Functions, I'm releasing this so anyone interested can take a look at how PigIron is coming along.

There should be another release next week.

The core mechanism (recursive descent parameter marshalling and transmission) works very well. Having implemented 5 VSMAPI Functions, I'm releasing this so anyone interested can take a look at how PigIron is coming along.

Four calls now working. Two reasons I have not yet written more.

1. I'm commenting the existing code, since the parameter marshalling and call management code work just peachy. That's "done", first cut.

2. I've autogenerated parameter and call spec code before using m4 macros. So possibly the rest of the calls and parameter complex types will be autogenerated that way. Looking at it.

The PigIron infrastructure code (recursive creation, writing, and reading of VSMAPI parameters) works.

I have implemented two calls in terms of the infrastructure, though these calls will be refactored and a superclass extracted, etc.

The two calls are ImageActiveConfigurationQuery and ImageQueryActivateTime ... will work on others this week.

I'm checking in code ... it compiles, so it must be correct, right? :-) It's not complete enough to run yet but it a browse will show you where the first cut of the param-and-call mechanism is going architecturally.

I'm writing java classes to communicate with z/VM SMAPI. If you know what SMAPI is, or this project may be of interest to you!

The code, starting from scratch as a NetBeans project (with no NetBeans dependencies) is coming along quickly.

In a few days I will do a checkin that will be able to demonstrate some SMAPI functionality.

I will be documenting my code, but for documentation on SMAPI itself, you will have to visit an IBM documentation site such as http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/zvm/v5r3/topic/com.ibm.zvm.v53.dmse6/hcsl8b20.htm