NetRexx

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NetRexx is an general-purpose programming language. It is a variant of the REXX programming language that runs on the Java virtual machine. In addition to the common REXX features it has simplified syntax in some cases, Java-like object-oriented extensions and exception handling, unlimited precision arithmetic, better internet and/or networking integration and the ability to function as either an interpreter or compile to a Java class.

History

When IBM was writing their own Java stack on OS/2 in 1995, Mike Cowlishaw implemented a version of REXX that would run under the Java environment, and released it in 1996. This was not only the first external language to be released under the Java system, it did not compile to Java code but to Java bytecode, so it was also the first program to take advantage of the JVM as a runtime environment rather than as a Java environment. NetRexx is written in itself rather than a Java program per se.

Note that even though the syntax is quite similar to REXX the language is in many ways quite different than "Classic REXX" so that even small programs will need to be ported to the environment.

Versions

1.00 (May 1997)
initial release by IBM
  • 1.01 (Jun 1997)
  • 1.02 (Jun 1997)
  • 1.103 (Jul 1997)
  • 1.120 (Sep 1997)
  • 1.130 (Mar 1998)
  • 1.140 (May 1998)
  • 1.150 (Jul 1999)
  • 1.160 (Jan 2000)
2.00 (Aug 2000)
NetRexx interpreter
  • 2.01 (Apr 2001)
  • 2.02 (May 2002)
  • 2.05 (Feb 2005) - IBM's last NetRexx release, for JVM versions 1.5 and earlier.
3.00 (Jun 2011)
On June 8th, 2011 IBM NetRexx was provided to The RexxLA to maintain and support.
  • 3.01 (2012-08-23) - first official RexxLA release
  • 3.02 (2013-06-25)
  • 3.03 (2014-06-11) - While V3.04 works fine on OS/2, all of the OS/2 specific scripts were removed from the distribution prior to its release, you should at the least keep a copy of V3.03 handy in case you need them.
  • 3.04 (2015-07-01) - Note, any version of NetRexx appears to work under Java for OS/2. However, version 3.03 has problems with some of the Java versions delivered for IBM mainframes while versions before 3.03 have problems running on Java 8 under windows.
  • 3.05 (2017-04-27)
  • 3.06 (2017-12-12)
  • 3.07 (2018-10-01)
  • 3.08 (2018-09-06) - restored OS/2 and Java 6 compatibility
  • 3.09 (2020-10-01)
  • 3.11 (2020-12-23)
4.01 (2021-03-21)
  • 4.04 (2022-09-12)
  • 4.05 (2023-05-10)

Related utilities

  • nrxdoc - documentation generator
  • Rexx2Nrx - Converts Classic REXX software to NetRexx - Open Source
Text editor support
  • Enhanced Editor - Syntax and NetRexx/Java class highlighting available as a separate download (EPMKWDS.NRX)
  • jEdit - Java based editor - NetRexx 3 syntax highlighting built in
    • NetRexxPlugin replaces earlier plugins NetRexxJe, NetRexxDE and NetRexxScript.

License

The 1.x and most 2.x versions of NetRexx are released under the IBM License Agreement for IBM Employee-Written Software.

Open source software released under the International Components for Unicode Licence (ICU) v1.8.1 - RexxLA

Articles

Publications

Articles
  • Mike Ingram: NetRexx - EXE Magazine, Feb 1997

Links

OS/2 e-Zine!
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