NaturalONE

NaturalONE is an Eclipse-based Integrated Development Environment (IDE) that lets developers code, test and maintain applications, expose Natural objects as services, create Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) and web interfaces, and manage the complete DevOps lifecycle. From one environment, you can modernize and deploy new applications more quickly with better quality to immediately satisfy your customers.

NaturalONE delivers a powerful and easy-to-use set of application lifecycle capabilities to current users of Natural as well as Java^® developers. It’s well-suited for developing applications to run natively on the mainframe, Linux^® and Windows^®.

Java programmers will find NaturalONE appealing to use because of its familiar Graphical User Interface (GUI) and wizards.

Because NaturalONE is Eclipse-based, you can standardize on a single platform across all program languages. You can efficiently cross-train personnel to deploy resources where they’re most needed—and at a moment’s notice.

NaturalONE is the default development environment for Natural. It is fully integrated with the DevOps tool chain familiar to Java developers. You’ll find it easier to recruit new programmers who will appreciate the collaborative DevOps support of NaturalONE for agile development and continuous integration. 

• Develop efficiently with teams using open-source versioning tools
• Improve productivity with repository-based team development
• Develop faster with content-assist and instant NatStyler
• Debug and test applications with automation to save time
• Maintain code change history
• Implement Natural in your DevOps toolchain
  
• Manage and document application lifecycles
• Modernize existing applications without restructuring source code
• Build new web applications and services with ease

Use NaturalONE as the one framework for all your application development, modernization and management needs. You will significantly lower the time and cost of application development, maintenance and staff training. You can develop and deploy web services faster and cut the time you spend on application maintenance!

With NaturalONE, you can develop new applications and modernize existing Natural applications—faster—to meet changing business requirements and reduce application development costs.

Develop faster with agile development

NaturalONE can accelerate delivery of new applications with automatic, interactive testing and debugging tools. Open-source versioning tools allow for team development where developers can write, test and execute programs independently while sharing the source code of the project in a team repository.

Provide high-quality applications with continuous integration

NaturalONE provides all maintenance and development tools, including automatic, interactive testing, debugging and profiling in a single environment.

Automated processes, like build and test, help reduce the time to deliver corrections and new features to end users while ensuring quality. Like Java developers, you can establish and automate unit tests using open-source tools such as Jenkins^®.

NaturalONE tools, like Profiling for runtime testing, complement the testing process and ensure that the performance of the components delivered meet the business requirements. 

Make new business functions available faster to users with DevOps

NaturalONE provides the tools to continuously build and test new business functions or corrections and deploy them into production. This ensures that new business functions and corrections are quickly available and deployed rapidly to ensure a high-quality production environment. Close cooperation and coordination between developers and users ensure changes will be accepted, satisfying the needs of end users. With continuous delivery, you can also ensure that your application addresses new regulations and standards quickly.  

NaturalONE operates in Linux or Windows and, because it is based on Eclipse, easily integrates with multiple Software AG Eclipse-based tools. Since work can be executed from one platform without having to open accompanying applications on their base platform, developers can efficiently collaborate and work on multiple platforms using a range of developer productivity tools from a single user interface.

From NaturalONE, you can use Construct, EntireX, Predict and many other tools by remotely connecting to your mainframe, Linux or Windows environment. For example, conduct Predict data dictionary maintenance and browse data using the integrated data browser for Natural Data Definition Modules.

Increase productivity

With NaturalONE, developers can significantly increase productivity. You can create front-end user interfaces—web- and map-based—and back-end business rules from within the same integrated development environment.

NaturalONE also provides tools to modernize existing applications in stages. You can transform existing map-based Natural applications into RIAs quickly with the benefit of increased end-user acceptance and productivity. At the same time, NaturalONE retains Natural’s core strength of simplicity in coding and rapid development of applications.

Modernize with AJAX

NaturalONE includes Natural for AJAX, which allows you to quickly transform Natural applications into web-based applications without restructuring source code. With more than 50 out-of-the-box GUI controls and responsive controls, this code design tool accelerates the development of RIAs.

With NaturalONE, you buy time to refine your RIA by meeting user demands quickly. You can quickly make existing Natural screens available through an internet browser by building web pages with an easy drag-and-drop editor. By simply saving a page layout, you automatically generate code to link the front-end web page to its back-end business logic. No training or experience needed in JavaScript^®, HTML or CSS!

Using new and existing Natural statements, you can quickly develop AJAX-based applications that access Adabas, DB2^®, VSAM or any other Natural-supported RDBMS. Applications can be deployed on standard Java application servers, such as JBoss^® or the WebSphere^® platform.  

Go mobile with AJAX

NaturalONE also offers an enhanced set of controls for supporting mobile devices based on “responsive design.” You can provide a consistent user experience across a variety of mobile devices and different operating systems (i.e., Android^®, iOS^®). NaturalONE provides you an invaluable set of tools for developing, testing and deploying mobile apps across multiple platforms.

Simplify service development

You can easily reuse existing Natural-business logic as a service. NaturalONE is integrated with Software AG’s webMethods platform for easy development, support and deployment of services to other environments such as Business Process Management (BPM). Any service available inside or outside your organization can be consumed as a NaturalONE object and you can call (bi-directional) services outside of the mainframe, Linux and Windows environment.

Improve team collaboration with repository-based team development

Developers can “check out” a copy of the latest source code from the repository and, if several developers work on the same source code, all changes to the code can be kept when the code is merged later upon “check-in.”

A developer can also create a new branch where he or she can work independently from other developers and then consolidate it with the master branch upon completion.

Maintain code change history

With NaturalONE, all versions of the source code are kept in the repository. Older source code can be re-activated and compared to different versions to see what really has changed.

Manage the application lifecycle

NaturalONE delivers a powerful and easy-to-use set of lifecycle management tools for current users of Natural as well as Java developers. The NaturalONE deployment procedures can be adapted to all existing lifecycle management processes in your enterprise. As all process steps in the lifecycle are documented, each step can be reproduced at a later time and is transparent for company revisions.

The future is NaturalONE

It’s time to embrace NaturalONE as your one and only Natural development environment. NaturalONE is the default development environment for Natural.NaturalONE and Natural Development Server are integrated into Natural.

Moving to NaturalONE allows you to leverage numerous free open-source plug-ins available for Eclipse and is very attractive to the next generation of developers, making it easier to hire new staff and motivate young developers to work with Natural. NaturalONE also gives you the ability to harmonize application development across your entire organization, whether you are developing applications in Natural, COBOL or Java to run natively on the mainframe, Linux or Windows.