Registration for our next meeting is now available on the Software AG web site. Cindy Gendron of TxDOT has agreed to give a presentation on their experiences with Adabas Replicator; I hope to have the rest of the agenda completed soon. Please sign up today so we’ll now how many to plan for!

Our next meeting will be Friday, January 9, 2009, in the AVAYA Auditorium (ACES 2.302) at the University of Texas at Austin. Please mark your calendar and plan to attend. While I have started on the agenda, there are still several slots to fill, so if you have a presentation you’d like to give please let me know.

I finally posted the presentations from the December 11 meeting:

• The Baby Boomer Exodus: Why the Common View is the Wrong View (and what you can do about it) by Sandra Wade, Software AG
• Natural for AJAX by Patrick Gould, Software AG
• Tamino: Getting there by Curtis Pew, The University of Texas at Austin
• Using Natural with Tamino (and other web-based XML resources) by Brick Jones, The University of Texas at Austin

The next meeting will be in May or June. We will again have elections for president and vice president. I will not be a candidate, so if you value the group please give serious consideration to running for office.

I have updated the agenda for our next meeting to include the rest of the presentations. As a reminder, it will be held on December 11 in the AVAYA Auditorium (ACE 2.302) on the University of Texas campus (map, parking map).

The two new presentations are:

• Tamino: Getting there

  Curtis Pew, The University of Texas at Austin

  A database has little value unless you can store information into it and extract information from it. This presentation gives an overview of different methods for interacting with Tamino. It includes a brief introduction to XQuery, the W3C standard XML query language used by Tamino, a description of the X-Machine commands used to communicate with Tamino, and a survey of the APIs available in various programming languages.

• Using Natural with Tamino (and other web-based XML resources)

  Brick Jones, The University of Texas at Austin

  This presentation will provide a quick overview of Natural’s http and XML technologies, including REQUEST DOCUMENT, PARSE XML and the XML Toolkit. We’ll look at how Natural can access and process XML documents from Tamino as well as retrieving data from public web services using the SOAP protocol.

Please register soon.

I have posted the agenda for our next meeting, which will be held on December 11 in the AVAYA Auditorium (ACE 2.302) on the University of Texas campus (map, parking map). (This is the same place we had our last meeting.)

The two presentations that have been confirmed so far are:

• The Baby Boomer Exodus: Why the Common View is the Wrong View (and what you can do about it)

  Sandra Wade, Director of Solutions Marketing, Software AG

  Most of the hand-wringing around the so-called IT workforce shortage has focused on the projected impact of the Baby Boom generation's retirement on specific skills areas such as the availability of COBOL programmers. However, the skills aspect of this inevitable generational shift is actually the least worrisome. Two other areas—domain knowledge and mission-critical expertise—are likely to have a more immediate and more significant impact on individual organizations. Based upon 20 years of IT experience, Sandra Wade will explore each of these three areas of concern to IT leaders and provide practical steps to head-off serious consequences.

• Natural for AJAX

  Patrick Gould, Software AG

  This presentation will cover the details about Natural for AJAX (NJX), its specifications and how it works. The Demonstration will cover the architecture required for NJX, how to build and deploy a web page and how to run the page in a live demo.

  Products demonstrated in the demo are Natural for AJAX (NJX) Natural for Eclipse (NFE), Natural for Windows, Natural Development Server (NDV), Natural Web I/O Server (NWO) and Natural on the Host (Mainframe or Linux)

I should have information about other presentations soon. Please register soon so we’ll know who can make it.

I have posted the presentations from yesterday’s meeting:

• From Legacy to SOA by Paul Brayden, Software AG
• EntireX RPC ACI Bridge by David Hupp, Software AG
• TRS Reporting And Query System (TRAQS) by Steve Fernandez and Carolyn Klassy, Teacher Retirement System of Texas
• EntireX version 7.3 New Features by David Hupp, Software AG

Also, we held elections for president and vice president. I couldn’t get anyone to challenge me for president, so I’ll continue to serve. Our new vice president is Carolyn Klassy of the Teacher Retirement System of Texas. Congratulations, Carolyn!

Our next meeting may be in November but more likely will not be until December.

I have posted the proposed Change/Enhancement requests that we will be voting on at Thursday’s meeting. If you have the time, please download and view them before the meeting so we will have more time for the presentations. If you will not be able to attend the meeting but wish to vote, send me a message and I’ll include your votes in the tally.

As a reminder, if you’re planning to attend, please register if you haven’t already. See you there.

Just a quick reminder that we have less than two weeks to go before our June 28 meeting. If you’re planning to attend, please register if you haven’t already. I think we’ve got a great agenda, so try to come if you can.

For those of you not subscribed to the SAG-L list server, I’d like to pass on a request from Jim Wisdom, who organizes and runs the Natural Conferences, about the possibility of a Natural Conference in 2008:

In formulating plans for a potential Natural Conference in August 2008 in Boston, I need some information.

Several of you have contacted me offline and wanted to know about our plans. In order to move forward I need to ask that if your and any of our work colleagues have an 80% of attending next year, please respond to me offline at jtwisdom@verizon.net. Please include your company name and a rough estimate of a count. I need to know no later than next Thursday. Please do not respond if there is only a slim chance. The bottom line is that I am looking for some assurances of interest and I m looking for a base count. I simply cannot accept the responsibility for such an event and put my personal finances in jeopardy after last year. Please understand we want to make this event happen; but our success depends heavily on your being there.

We are planning a slightly different event in that we recognize the need to speak more to the Unix/Windows environments and are planning accordingly. I can promise you this will be the BEST ever. But to move forward with the possibility of repeating another financial disaster would be unconscionable to me. So help me to help you.

Also, if you think your management might consider it if they heard more directly from the planning committee, I am prepared to visit several sites while in the area of user group meetings. I want this to be a win-win situation and sometimes a little direct marketing might help.

So please take the time to respond and by next week I will hope to know better where I stand.

Jim Wisdom, Natural Conference coordinator

If think you or others in your organization have a good chance of being able to attend, please let Jim know.

I have published the completed agenda for our June 28 meeting. As a reminder, it will be held in the AVAYA Auditorium (ACE 2.302) on the University of Texas campus (map, parking map). We will have four presentations:

• From Legacy to SOA, by Shane McMillan of Software AG. This presentation has been given at other regional user group meetings, and has received rave reviews.
• EntireX RPC ACI Bridge, by David Hupp of Software AG. This presentation is being given by special request from one of our members.
• TRS Reporting And Query System (TRAQS), by Steve Fernandez and Carolyn Klassy of the Teacher Retirement System of Texas. See a real application using VB.NET, EntireX, Impersonation, Natural, and RACF.
• EntireX version 7.3 New Features, by David Hupp of Software AG. Learn about what’s new for EntireX.

Also, note that we will be holding officer elections as part of the business. In the past, the only officer we’ve had is a president, but I would like to add a position of vice president. Please give serious thought to putting your name forward to serve as president or vice president. The duties are light (participating in a conference call with other regional presidents every other month, and scheduling these meetings and developing the agenda.) The benefits include getting to know other Software AG customers, the opportunity to hear about new developments a little ahead of most people, having a little more input on Software AG directions, and personal and professional development. So think about it, talk it over with your management, and come prepared to vote.

Please register for the meeting soon so we can get a count for the caterers. See you there!

Our next meeting will be Thursday, June 28, 2007, in the AVAYA Auditorium (ACES 2.302) at the University of Texas at Austin. I have four presentations already scheduled (see the next meeting page for details), and probably could squeeze another one in if anyone would like to give one.

You can register for the meeting at the Software AG web site. I look forward to seeing you there.