Re: 'Scripts' & Communications

From: Christopher Green (cj.green_at_worldnet.att.net)
Date: 04/16/04 

Date: 15 Apr 2004 16:09:45 -0700

azog <dev@null.com> wrote in message news:<20040414142309.0000126f.dev@null.com>...
> On Wed, 14 Apr 2004 14:58:15 GMT
> "John Berg" <johnberg@mchsi.com> wrote:
>
> >
> > Want to guess when IBM gave up EBCDIC?
> >
>
> I would guess, if IBM ever gave up EBCDIC, it would have had to have
been later than the year 2000. In 1996, we were still using an
ES/9000, with VSE (it's been some time, I forget if that's the OS it
was running). The only reason I say "after 2000" is that is the year
when we decommissioned that particular machine, and IBM dropped out of
my lore knowledge. But I think IBM is still producing big iron*, and
some of those running MVS, or one of their other operating systems.
>
> * the funny thing about IBM "big iron" is that, near the end, it was all microprocessor-driven anyways. So our ES/9000 was a box the size of several refrigerators, but inside was simply a small cube about one-and-a-half foot, which contained the machine. The rest was chassis, air control, and striving for a sense of awe.

IBM was using ASCII for dumb terminals as early as 1980. I worked on
one, and a POS it was at that. They still use EBCDIC on the flagship
z890 and z990 mainframes. The probably have to keep millions of lines
of source code that depend on EBCDIC working for the sort of customers
who prefer those beasts.

See "EBCDIC and the P-Bit" by Bob Bemer (the "Father of ASCII),
http://www.bobbemer.com/P-BIT.HTM, for an informed view to the effect
that EBCDIC was a colossal blunder.

Also see "How to Tell a Mainframe Techie" by Rick C. on Slashdot:

10) They view a PC/MAC as a dumb terminal "with this neat copy/paste
thingie."

9) They know EBCDIC and are totally annoyed that numbers sort before
letters in ASCII.

8) They are also annoyed that PC keyboards use the new-line key as
ENTER.

7) "Fiber optic cable" means a 36-pair trunk. Anything less is just a
device jumper.

6) They think that less than eight fiber paths to any device
constitutes an I/O bottleneck.

5) They laugh at COBOL programmers. To their faces.

4) The largest program they ever wrote was 12K. The coolest was 160
bytes.

3) They know what the "National" character set is.

2) They wince at a 1.2-million line core dump, but they're glad they
don't have to print it like they did in the old days.

1) They can read that core dump like it was source code. 

-- 
Chris Green

Relevant Pages

  • Re: How would you do this?
    ... IBM has recently created an LE callable service, CEE3INF, ... my question is how various "experienced" COBOL programmers would ... environments for those who see this note and don't work in IBM mainframe ...
    (comp.lang.cobol)
  • Re: How would you do this?
    ... IBM has recently created an LE callable service, CEE3INF, ... my question is how various "experienced" COBOL programmers would ... environments for those who see this note and don't work in IBM mainframe ...
    (comp.lang.cobol)