[progress Communities] [progress Openedge Abl] Forum Post: Re: New Appserver And Propath...

[Simon L. Prinsloo]

The PASOE instance supports multiple ABL Applications, but PASOE starts one (or more) _mproapsv process for each ABL Application. This process is the AVM and the PROPATH belongs to it. When you shell out of it, you expect to have the same environment as you would have when you shell out of a traditional AppServer. When you shell out of an _mproapsv process of another ABL Application on the same PASOE instance, you expect to have the same environment as you would have had if you shelled out of a traditional AppServer serving that application. Setting PROPATH in *_serenv.sh is too soon. That set the environment for the Java process that parents the _mproapsv processes, so they will share the SAME value, which is wrong. When we shell out, _mproapsv is the parent process. We inherit the environment of the direct parent and need the environment to be as tailored for this process, rather than variables inherited indirectly from the grand parent process. By moving PROPATH to openedge.properties, the propath is no longer set in the environment, but rather in the "registry", as we've done with prowin32 for ages. Normally, if you run MESSAGE OS-GETENV("PROPATH") in Windows, you get an unknown value. The same is now true for PASOE. In DOS and UNIX we have to set PROPATH, in Windows (and possibly PASOE?) that works for compatibility reasons, but it is not required (or desired) that it be done. That being said, shelling out of Windows force once to jump through hoops when PROPATH is needed in the shell. I guess I've just convinced myself that this is not a bug, but a natural progression beyond shell variables. I am sure that ChuiMonster would LOVE this move closer to Windows. ;-) It would be quite nice if OS-COMMAND / DOS / UNIX / INPUT THROUGH could populate the PROPATH environment variable, if it is undefined, before spawning the shell. I would therefor suggest two things: a) That PSC add pertinent note in the PASOE migration and reference documentation to note that the PROPATH environment variable is now redundant and not desired. b) That anybody who feels the need to propagate this value to the shell create an enhancement request.

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