HercJobs build 9-2-24 (significantly working)

FINALLY

This release of HercJobs is now able to define and work with both card readers and printers. Punches are not completed at this time.
Jobs submit, and output is collected. The output is displayed on your screen immediately after it's generated. Additionally, a pdf is created and saved in the application directory.

INSTALLATION

First of all, this is a Windows only application. Download the release zip file, and extract it to a directory on your hard drive.
Execute HercJobs.exe (this is a portable installation, no setup program--if you want a shortcut, Send one to your desktop)

YOU WILL NEED TO DEFINE YOUR CARD READER AND PRINTER USING THE SETUP MENU

When you have defined them, exit the program and restart it. You should see your devices listed in the various spots on your screen

To submit a job, you can drag the file onto the reader listbox, or you can use the Load Deck button. If you drag and drop, you can select multiple files to submit at the same time. The reader queue allows you to select multiple files and re-order the sequence they'll be submitted.

When any output is generated on a defined printer (not just jobs submitted through this application) they will be shown in a popup window, and saved as a PDF in your local directory. NOTE! Hercules printers must be configured as a sockdev. This application will NOT complain if it cannot connect to your hercules output devices, it will silently continue running. What this means is that if you tell this program to connect to hercules and the device is already connected to another program (such as virtual1403) you will not get an error message, nor will you get the output. Virtual1403 will still have the connection. Should you define incorrect hosts or ports, you will get a socket error. This may change in the future, unfortunately it appears to be a combination of the way .NET handles connections, and the way hercules handles rejections.

Release Binary 8-25-24

This is the 8-25-24 precompiled Release version. This release contains some code to define output devices, but still is not functional. It also contains code to allow you to set up a queue of files to send to the reader as well as control the order those jobs will be submitted. By selecting the new button 'Reader Queue' you can add jobs decks in the new form by right clicking on a grid row and selecting Select files from the dropdown menu. In the resulting "Open file" dialog you can select multiple files. They will all be placed in the grid. If you want to change the order the jobs will be submitted, select the row of the item to change, right click to the dropdown menu, and you can select "Move Up" or "Move Down" to change the order. When you click on "Queue" the jobs will be placed in the main form's Deck list for submission. The application will warn you to Pause your reader before doing this; however you have the option of releasing them as soon as you hit the Queue button. If you Cancel from the Reader Queue screen, any selections you've not Queued will be removed and not remembered. At this point there is NO DRAG-DROP for the new form. Eventually I'll add it. Suggestions and comments are appreciated. Thanks to Greg on Discord/Mainframe Enthusiasts for this suggestion!

Second build from 8-23-24

New build that now saves the reader configuration. Additionally, pausing and restarting the readers works as intended. Jobs submitted during a paused state, stack up in the Deck list. Once restarted, they are all submitted in batch.

Note: If you close the program without starting the readers, any jobs in the Deck list will NOT be submitted when the program is re-opened.

Alpha release from 8-23-24.

Release binary from August 23, 2024. This is a portable Windows only binary. This release supports drag and drop of jcl files into the Decklist. Note, not all functions are complete such as Start/Stop readers. Readers are always active at this point. Further releases will handle this.

You need to reconfigure the reader EVERY time for the moment. Saving the reader configuration is next on my list of things to do :)

Additionally, jobs submit to a local machine VERY fast. Once the job has been submitted, it is removed from the Deck list. Sometimes this happens fast enough you don't even see it go into the list. The log box will show you the status of submitted jobs.

Future plans include being able to connect to a Hercules sockdev printer and generate output. Note, that it is not possible to know what a jobs number is via the reader, so any printer connected to this app (when it supports it) will receive whatever output is sent to that printer. This is all in the future anyhow, so let me know what you think about what it does at the moment, which is submit jcl to hercules on the 3505 device.