BCD Tech Blog

WebSmart 8.8 is now available for download at our public site or via myBCDSoftware.com (no form to fill out). Sign up now for the WebSmart 8.8 New Features webinar!

The download also includes Clover 2.6 and the latest updates to WebSmart PHP.

Upgrade and Installation Instructions
There are no special installation or upgrade instructions for this version unless you are upgrading from a much older release. Contact Technical Support if you have questions.

WebSmart 8.8 New Features
Here is an overview of the main features in WebSmart 8.8:

• All ILE, PHP and Clover templates use the jQuery JavaScript library for improved cross browser compatibility, flexibility and power.
• This version includes support for local variables, function parameters and return values.
• New templates that use keys instead of RRN for record access for faster SQL queries.
• WebSmart Change Management (WCM) now has a tool bar in the IDE to access common functions.
• New SmartSnippets for PHP Record Level Access. This feature has been included in conjunction with our dropping the PHP RLA templates.
• You can now use the keyboard combination CTRL-G to go to a particular line.
• F1 context sensitive help for JavaScript files in the IDE.
• The F1 function reference help now accesses online HTML help, which we can update more readily.
• In SQL programs the cursor name is now the program name, rather than MC.
• Added a “Changed” flag to let you know an open definition has changed (* following .pdw in Title Bar).
• SQL Utility now word wraps and vertically scrolls.
• The Fields window shows the actual type for numeric fields.
• We have increased the size of a number of internal files.
• There is a new utility accessible via your WAS configuration pages that allows you to list the service programs used by the WebSmart programs in a particular library.

Please visit the WebSmart New Features page for additional details.

Documentation Note: The functions reference section of the guide (the help available in the IDE when you press F1 in the PML) has been updated in this initial release of 8.8, but the rest of the documentation is not yet complete. We’ll send another email to this list as soon as all the guides are done. In the meantime, please review the items on the New Features page or call Technical Support if you have questions about specific features.

RPG programmers who are new to web development have probably come accross the terms “Cross Site Scripting (XSS)” and “SQL Injection”, and can probably relate them to web application security topics. If you are concerned about security, and most likely you are, further research is needed in order to understand and prevent these risks .

What exactly is XSS? How can it be prevented? What is an example of SQL injection? Do I have the correct code to prevent such exploits on my application? Without a doubt, these are some of the many questions that come to mind. To get a better understanding of these topics and other security concerns, I strongly recommend that you take a look at the article “Common Security Mistakes in Web Applications”, hosted by Smashing Magazine.

This is probably one of the best articles I’ve read in terms of its simplicity and clarity. It provides you with straightforward examples and a solid explanation of each concept. Even though the article refers to PHP coding techniques, the same concepts will apply for web applications developed with other programming languages or tools, including WebSmart ILE. Enjoy!

We have recently discovered a WebSmart 8.2 upgrade issue we wanted to bring to your attention, and there is also a new update available for download. Knowledge Base production also continues unabated and I’ve included a sampling of recent ones at the bottom of this message.

WebSmart 8.2 Upgrade Issue
We have found a problem with how early versions of WebSmart 8.2 generated a data structure’s D-specs. This issue affected versions 6247, 6303, 6369 and 6406  (you can confirm your current version from the Help/About WebSmart menu option in the IDE) in the following circumstances:

• a file contains a field of type B or S
• the program declares a struct that contains the type B or S field

In these circumstances Numeric subfields of a data structure were incorrectly generated as Packed, regardless of their actual type. This can cause issues if this struct is serialized as a transaction, smurf, or database record. The most likely symptoms of this are decimal data errors or other data corruption occurring after you generate one of the programs in your application.

We don’t expect this to be a common issue, and it is fixed in the PC build 6807 and higher. However, if you feel this is affecting you, please review KB Article 8467 for additional details and information on resolving this issue.

WebSmart 8.2 Server Side Update
You can now download iSeries update W8200004 for WebSmart 8.20. This update resolves issues where the posturl function would generate a Pointer Not Set error when *DEFAULT was used for the header parm.

Recent KB Articles
Here are a few of our most recent KB articles, for WebSmart ILE, PHP, Clover and SmartCharts:

• Article 8454. How can I make my Excel reports recognize dates correctly? [Clover]
• Article 8442. How can I dynamically load a menu depending on the user’s access level? [WebSmart ILE]
• Article 8435. How to validate externally declared PHP functions.
• Article 8423. I’m storing encrypted data in a file, but it’s not being retrieved or decrypted properly. What could be happening, and how can I resolve this? [WebSmart PHP]
• Article 8432. How can I use HTML in my SmartCharts?
• Article 8346. How do I load my own logo to be displayed on a SmartChart?
• Article 8185. I have a program that features a SmartChart and a jQuery date picker. When the date picker is activated it appears underneath the SmartChart and I am unable to select a date. How can I resolve this?

If you visit the KB, try the new Google Beta search!

It’s difficult to find which program is producing an SQL error by looking in the joblog, especially for Apache instance jobs (CGI jobs). You can see the error, but you can’t find out the name of the program that issued it. To solve this problem, you can use SQL Performance Monitor tools. You can start an SQL Performance Monitor one of two ways:

• Use System i Navigator, expand the Databases tree node for the system you are connected to, right-click on SQL Performance Monitors and create a new one.
• Run command STRDBMON from a command line.

You can limit which jobs get monitored (with either approach). For example, if you want all the INTERNET Apache instance jobs, just specify a job name of INTERNET.

To end the monitor, use the same interface in System i Navigator, or use the ENDDBMON command.

Make sure you create the monitor to collect detailed, not summary information. You can also choose the file and library name in which to store the collected information.

Don’t leave the monitor running for too long- it has a negative performance impact on the system, and it writes lots of data quickly.

You can easily query the output table to find errors. For example, I started a monitor via the System i Navigator which output data to a table called QZG0000048 in library DUNCAN. Using STRSQL, you can find SQL errors and their corresponding program names. Use this query:

SELECT qqi8 as "sqlstate",qqc81 as "sqlcode",qqc104 as
"program library",qqc103 as"program name",qqc21,qq1000 FROM
qzg0000048 WHERE qqrid=1000 and qqi8 < 0 ORDER BY qqstim

There are lots of other fields in this file, too, such as job name, user name, etc. but be careful, because if you try to select all the fields for viewing using STRSQL your 5250 session might end abnormally – some of the fields contain binary data that is illegal to display.

One of our developers just posted this link to our internal blog:

http://www.webaxes.com/2010/05/30-cheat-sheets-for-web-developers-and-designers/

This site has over 30 cheat sheets for web developers, including Dreamweaver, Fireworks, WordPress, jQuery and several for CSS, PHP and HTML.

The BCD Product Development team has run a series of tests of the following versions of our software at V7R1:

• Catapult 7.6
• Spool-Explorer 4.5
• Exodus 5.1
• WebSmart 8.2
• Presto 2.2
• ProGen 9.5
• DBGen 2.5
• Docu-Mint 6.5
• File-Flash Plus 4.5
• Nexus 3.6 and 4.0

No problems were encountered.

If you have any questions about this, please contact Technical Support.

Search terms: 7.1 V7 R1