Special considerations for accessing SOAP services from IBM® i COBOL programs

Special considerations apply to accessing SOAP services from EGL-generated COBOL programs on IBM® i. For an overview of the runtime architecture, see Overview of EGL support for SOA.

To integrate COBOL and Java™, your IBM® i system must fulfill the following prerequisites:

Running version 5 release 3 or later
Must be configured to use JNI.
You must know how to use XML on your IBM® i system. Information on this topic can be found at https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/ssw_ibm_i_74/rzamj/rzamjmain.htm.
You must have the Java™ classpath set up correctly. Information about the Java™ classpath can be found at https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/ssw_ibm_i_74/rzaha/classpth.htm and https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/ssw_ibm_i_74/rzaha/sysprop.htm.

When you generate or deploy the EGL deployment descriptor, EGL creates an ant script called CopyiSeriesJNILibs.xml and places the ant script into the directory specified in the genDirectory build descriptor option. This ant script will copy the EGL runtime JAR files, and the required WSDL files, to a directory you choose; then they will be copied to the IBM® i system. If the directory specified in thegenDirectory build descriptor option is a mapped drive from the IBM® i system, the JAR files will be copied directly to the IBM® i system.

It is easiest to initiate this from within the workbench by following these steps:

In the workbench, locate the ant script (CopyiSeriesJNILibs.xml).
Right-click the file and then click Run As > External Tools. You can use this script to enter the required argument for Target directory. The script will accept the following 3 arguments:

-DtargetDir=d:\localiseries

This is the target directory. There is no default for this argument. The ant script will not run without this argument.

-DprocessJars=true

This argument causes the script to copy the JAR files. Without this argument the JAR files will not be copied. When you use this argument, the JAR files will be copied once and you will save time by not processing them over and over again. If the target directory is an IBM® i mapped drive, you do not have to modify this argument, because the ant script will copy only files that have changed. This means the JAR files will always be kept up-to-date.

-DskipWsdl=true

This argument causes the script to skip copying the WSDL files. Without this argument, the WSDL files are copied just like the JAR files.

When you generate your EGL deployment descriptor, EGL also creates a SystemDefault.properties file. This file is intended to act as a template for you to use in modifying the main SystemDefault.properties file in the /QIBM/UserData/Java400 directory on your IBM® i system. You must change the setting for JAR_HOME_DIR to match the target directory you specified in the ant script. The SystemDefault.properties file contains the following two properties:

java.class.path=JAR_HOME_DIR:JAR_HOME_DIR/lib/axis.jar:JAR_HOME_DIR/lib/axis-ant.jar:JAR_HOME_DIR/lib/commons-discovery-0.2.jar:JAR_HOME_DIR/lib/jaxrpc.jar:JAR_HOME_DIR/lib/saaj.jar:JAR_HOME_DIR/lib/wsdl4j-1.5.1.jar:JAR_HOME_DIR/lib/commons-logging-1.0.4.jar:JAR_HOME_DIR/libfda7.jar:JAR_HOME_DIR/lib/eglwsdl.jar
user.timezone=EDT