What is Natural Single Point of Development?

This document covers the following topics:

Introduction

If you have been developing applications using Natural in a non-graphical environment, you have undoubtedly become familiar with Natural's wide range of capabilities and most likely also with some of its inconveniences and shortcomings. You have probably quite often wished for a more advanced user interface for "your Natural". With Natural Single Point of Development, your wish has indeed become reality.

Simply speaking, one might say that Natural Single Point of Development is an integrated development environment (IDE) for Natural application development for different platforms.

Actually, the Natural Single Point of Development concept covers more than a simple IDE in that it combines the advantages of two disparate worlds:

  • the strengths of the character-based Natural products and

  • the ease of use provided with NaturalONE and Natural for Windows.

Natural Single Point of Development is more than wishful thinking - it is indeed one Natural IDE for all.

The Idea Behind SPoD

Natural's Single Point of Development approach is Software AG's response to the increasing demand for a state-of-the-art development workstation for building, testing and maintaining all Natural applications throughout their lifecycle and across all supported platforms.

The standard SPoD architecture comprises the following products:

  • NaturalONE
    NaturalONE is a development client that is based on Eclipse and which can be used in Windows and Linux environments.

  • Natural for Windows
    Natural for Windows is a development client that is based on Software AG technology and which can be used in a Windows environment. Natural for Windows includes Natural Studio, which is the actual interface where software engineers design applications.

  • Natural Development Server
    Natural Development Server (NDV) resides on each Natural installation in the target environment, enabling it for remote development. It is available for mainframes (z/OS, z/VSE, BS2000), UNIX, Linux, OpenVMS and Windows. The development server maintains a development server file (FDIC) for loading information and application definitions.

  • Natural for the target platform
    Natural at the target platform plus Natural Development Server make up the Natural development server environment.

Optionally:

  • Natural Security
    Natural Security can be used for both the development client and the development server, if you wish to secure the local environment or the target environment.

Additional development products and tools can be integrated to make up a full-flanged Natural development environment for increased developer productivity. For example:

  • Predict
    Predict is an active data dictionary system which is used to describe information processing systems. It also provides functions to use this information when designing, implementing, using and maintaining the system.

    You can use the optional Predict component of NaturalONE to document Natural sources in Predict via NaturalONE, manipulate and retrieve data stored by Predict on the server, and manage external objects (generation and administration). See the NaturalONE documentation for further information.

    If you are working with Natural Studio, you can use the following plug-ins: Natural X-Ref Evaluation plug-in, Object Description plug-in, Schema Generation plug-in.

  • CentraSite
    You can use the optional Lifecycle Manager component of NaturalONE to deploy Natural applications (or specific versions of Natural applications) to different environments and to keep track of the installed applications in each environment. The Lifecycle Manager is based on CentraSite and uses Natural projects. See the NaturalONE documentation for further information.

  • Predict Application Control (PAC)
    PAC is a flexible tool for controlling Natural and foreign applications throughout the software lifecycle and for ensuring the integrity of applications in the production environment. PAC facilitates and controls the movement of applications through the lifecycle. When an application is implemented into production, it is protected and audited by Predict Application Audit (PAA). If you are working with Natural Studio, you can use the Object Versioning plug-in.

  • Natural Construct
    Natural Construct is a powerful, easy-to-use, model-based application generator that helps you create and implement high-quality, robust Natural applications.

    You can use the optional component Natural Construct component of NaturalONE to reuse your existing Natural Construct models in NaturalONE, and to create new Natural Construct models or code frames. See the NaturalONE documentation for further information.

  • Natural Engineer
    Natural Engineer is a versatile maintenance and reengineering tool that cuts costs and enhances productivity. It enables you to respond faster to technological developments such as the Web, while fully leveraging prior investment in Natural applications and in proven business logic.

    You can use the optional NaturalONE component Natural Engineer to convert Natural objects containing INPUT statements for use with Natural for Ajax pages. See the NaturalONE documentation for further information.

    If you are working with Natural Studio, you can use the Metrics and XRef Viewing plug-in.

  • Natural ISPF (Integrated Structured Programming Facility)
    Natural ISPF is Software AG's application development tool for the building, testing and maintenance of applications throughout their lifecycle.

    You can use the optional NaturalONE component Mainframe Tools to access and manipulate objects stored on a mainframe from Eclipse. The objects are displayed in a tree structure and can be browsed and edited.

    If you are working with Natural Studio, you can use the Mainframe Navigation plug-in.

Powerful Features

Natural's Single Point of Development approach is Software AG's response to the increasing demand for a state-of-the-art development workstation for building, testing and maintaining all Natural applications throughout their lifecycle and across all supported platforms. It offers the following powerful features:

  • NaturalONE or Natural Studio - a unified consistent interface
    With the integrated development environment (IDE) of NaturalONE or Natural Studio, software engineers can perform all the necessary development tasks, including file manipulation, editing, compiling, debugging, and cross referencing. Developers can manipulate (move, copy) program objects, wherever those objects are located. Natural source files are transparently retrieved from and saved to the target environment, and edited in the IDE. Compiles are initiated from the IDE by submitting commands to the target environment. The application executes on the target environment with debugging controlled from the IDE.

  • Client/server architecture enables one single remote development environment for all platforms
    Natural Single Point of Development is based on a client/server concept. On the client side, NaturalONE or Natural Studio offers a single, uniform view for all Natural developers. The graphical user interface is the basis for a single, uniform working environment for all platforms (mainframe, mid-range and Windows computer systems) supported by Natural. For more details, refer to Natural SPoD Architecture.

  • Full remote development access after mapping to the target environment
    For remote development, NaturalONE or Natural Studio can be enabled to interact with a development server that can be located on a single or multiple, homogeneous or heterogeneous mainframe or mid-range computer systems. Once you have mapped your target environment in the client, you have a set of convenient and effective tools at hand that enable you to perform all development tasks. You can use the functionality to the extent it is available there. To prevent concurrent updates when you work directly in the target environment, the object under work is locked. For more details, refer to Remote Development Interface.

  • Application concept in Natural for Windows giving a logical view to distributed applications
    To meet the requirements of a new, distributed application development scenario, an application concept is available with Natural for Windows which provides a logical view of Natural and future objects on the various sites where they are developed and used. On the workstation screen, this is complemented by an application workspace which shows all distributed objects of an application in a tree structure. For more details, refer to SPoD Application Concept in Natural Studio.

    Note:
    The SPoD application concept is not supported by NaturalONE.

  • Remote development server file
    To cope with the requirements of the distributed application concept, a central data dictionary file is available. This file has the same structure as the well-known Natural system file FDIC. The central data dictionary file stores the information where the objects linked to an application are located and which objects are locked.

  • Web development with Natural's enhanced XML capabilities
    Several Software AG development components, which are included in or are complementary to the SPoD environment, specifically take advantage of the XML standard. These include the DBMS layer, with Tamino XML Server, and the Natural language itself, with XML Toolkit for Natural. In addition, Natural supports XML-supplied XSL/stylesheet-based presentation clients for Web browsers.