Re: Our community strengths
Linda Mooney referred to the 'stolen servers' IBM ad, and the lack of follow-up. Years ago, IBM did an ad which showed what looked like a UAL jet taking off. The caption was How to get to Chicago one year earlier - OS/2 Warp. If you don't remember, Chicago was the code name for Windows 93, oops Windows 94, oops Windows 95. The ad wasn't quite right as the time was more than a year. This was a very inventive ad, and as an OS/2 fanatic, I was really disappointed that there was no follow-up. However, there was in IBM-internal rumor (which may have been an urban legend) that the ad campaign was killed by an IBM exec when he was shown the material. Noting that the proposal included ads in Dr. Dobb's Journal, he laid down the dictum that We don't advertise in medical journals.. It still mystifies me how inferior products win out in the marketplace, especially when the losers are the products I prefer (lame attempt at humor). I used OS/2 for years, and I could count the number of unscheduled reboots on my fingers (without my toes), which is a whole lot better than with my wife's Windoze machines, and even better than my current Mac machine. I only stopped using Warp when it became impossible to get a new printer with Warp support, and my old EPSON laser EPL6600 finally died after quite a few years of unblemished service. Dale Miller -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
Re: Our community strengths
On 10/27/2011 7:08 PM, Dale Miller wrote: machine. I only stopped using Warp when it became impossible to get a new printer with Warp support, and my old EPSON laser EPL6600 finally died after quite a few years of unblemished service. I built my own machine in 1984; the only change was to replace the 64K motherboard with a 256K one a few years later. Has been running Warp without a hitch, while several Windoze machines have come and gone. My current printer is a Kyocera 1600; it and supplies are available on eBay. There are other printers out there that do not require Windows or Mac drivers. Gerhard Postpischil Bradford, VT -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
Re: Our community strengths
This is an interesting thread. I listened to a webex by a Dr. at IBM entitled How to reduce mips ... It was a great run at the techie numbers of server versus z196 / z114 hybrid computing with customer examples. I'd love to see more like it too. If you send me a note off line, I'd send the power point. Chip Grantham | Ameritas | Sr. IT Consultant | cgrant...@ameritas.com 5900 O Street, Lincoln NE 68510 | p: 402-467-7382 | c: 402-429-3579 | f: 402-325-4030 Linda Mooney linda.lst...@comcast.net Sent by: IBM Mainframe Discussion List IBM-MAIN@bama.ua.edu 10/25/2011 10:24 PM Please respond to IBM Mainframe Discussion List IBM-MAIN@bama.ua.edu To IBM-MAIN@bama.ua.edu cc Subject Re: Our community strengths Hi Steve, I frequently run into people who remember the IBM ad about the servers being stolen, but they have really been consolodated onto the one mainframe. There weren't any follow on ads about how well that worked out for the company, nothing with the worried and frightened looking boss happliy going over the balance sheets, looking good at the customer meetings, getting promoted for his vision, winning recognition in the local community for going green. I am often reading one of th e fine manuals on transit and when folks look curious, we chat. Most say that they thought that the mainframe was gone now - they don't hear anything more about it. They are always surprised to hear about some of the mainframes here, in my area, and the kind of work they do. That IBM ad seems to be the last thing that many of the public has heard about mainframes. For all of the efforts any of us make, if the public isn't informed, and encouraged, they aren't going to go to work and talk about how they heard, saw, read that mainframes were more reliable, better suited to critical services, etc. With the z196 and z114 now in play, where are the marketers? It is insufficient for t hem to market only to the relative few who already know. The Super Bowl is coming soon. I'm hopeful, but I'm not holding my breath. Thanks, Linda - Original Message - From: Steve Comstock st...@trainersfriend.com To: IBM-MAIN@bama.ua.edu Sent: Tuesday, October 25, 2011 7:32:51 PM Subject: Re: Our community strengths On 10/25/2011 7:36 PM, Dale Miller wrote: OK, so we squabble, and disagree, but it is my belief that this community has in its membership many of the giants who built a technological marvel that underpins our society today, or at least would do so if management could be induced to extend its event-horizon beyond the current fiscal year, and to start counting real costs. Most of us have plied our trade in an environment where an unplanned outage or functional failure were simply not to be allowed. Because we built systems to perform well and reliably, we were invisible, except when we made mistakes. I'm sure I'm not alone in experiencing the almost-every-day complaint from a clerk in a store that 'the computer isn't working right today'. I believe that we should be getting the word out that computers don't have to act this way, and that we know how to build systems that behave properly. We certainly face an uphill battle against the mind-set among management that leads them to set unreasonable requirements for job descriptions and set the salary schedules far below current going rates. It really gets my goat that they use these machinations to spread the lies that they cannot get skilled IT personnel. See http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052970204422404576596630897409182-lMyQjAxMTAxMDIwNDEyNDQyWj.html?mod=wsj_share_email . I retired when I could no longer put up with the asininity of company politics, but if I wanted to continue in my chosen career, I would certainly undertake to build my skills in database, communications, and UNIX, however distasteful that might be. I could go on for hours about the poor design features of UNIX and current email and internet protocols, but if I needed a job, I would swallow my pride and start hitting the books. Of course, with the current political climate regarding Social Security and Medicare, I might have to go back to work. Perhaps I should have made larger private investments, but then maybe I would have invested in Enron, AIG, Lehman Brothers, or Bernie Madoff. Dale Miller You'd think IBM would be interested in telling the story. But, sadly, that doesn't seem to be the case. I have been after many IBM'ers to launch an effort to win the hearts and minds of people in IT and to raise the level of awareness of mainframes (especially z/OS) in the general public. But they don't seem to care about it: they are either hopelessly lost or they have a future plan that does not include z/OS. -- Kind regards, -Steve Comstock The Trainer's Friend, Inc. 303-393-8716 http://www.trainersfriend.com
Re: Our community strengths
I agree, and the servers being stolen ads were some of the best commercials around, there should have been follow on ads to those. - I frequently run into people who remember the IBM ad about the servers being stolen, but they have really been consolodated onto the one mainframe. There weren't any follow on ads about how well that worked out for the company, nothing with the worried and frightened looking boss happliy going over the balance sheets, looking good at the customer meetings, getting promoted for his vision, winning recognition in the local community for going green. -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
Re: Our community strengths
I agree. And with z/OS, it's even worse than other. Windows is just a pile of shit that management understands why so many techies are needed to keep it running. We run z/OS with 3.5 (manager is a techie part of the time). We maintain much more of the company core business than Windows. But it's invisible because it just works. So management looks at the z as a place to get rid of people because they aren't needed. I actually like UNIX. Well, I like Fedora 15 on my PCs. More than I like TSO. I also like CMS more than TSO. I like a sharp stick more than TSO grin. Of course, running batch reports is not as good as with z/OS. I don't know of much in UNIX which can really match even 50% of CA-7, CA-11, and CA-1. But I admit to ignorance of what is generally available in UNIX for this type of thing. On Tue, 2011-10-25 at 18:36 -0700, Dale Miller wrote: OK, so we squabble, and disagree, but it is my belief that this community has in its membership many of the giants who built a technological marvel that underpins our society today, or at least would do so if management could be induced to extend its event-horizon beyond the current fiscal year, and to start counting real costs. Most of us have plied our trade in an environment where an unplanned outage or functional failure were simply not to be allowed. Because we built systems to perform well and reliably, we were invisible, except when we made mistakes. I'm sure I'm not alone in experiencing the almost- every-day complaint from a clerk in a store that 'the computer isn't working right today'. I believe that we should be getting the word out that computers don't have to act this way, and that we know how to build systems that behave properly. We certainly face an uphill battle against the mind-set among management that leads them to set unreasonable requirements for job descriptions and set the salary schedules far below current going rates. It really gets my goat that they use these machinations to spread the lies that they cannot get skilled IT personnel. See http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052970204422404576596630897409182-lMyQjAxMTAxMDIwNDEyNDQyWj.html?mod=wsj_share_email . I retired when I could no longer put up with the asininity of company politics, but if I wanted to continue in my chosen career, I would certainly undertake to build my skills in database, communications, and UNIX, however distasteful that might be. I could go on for hours about the poor design features of UNIX and current email and internet protocols, but if I needed a job, I would swallow my pride and start hitting the books. Of course, with the current political climate regarding Social Security and Medicare, I might have to go back to work. Perhaps I should have made larger private investments, but then maybe I would have invested in Enron, AIG, Lehman Brothers, or Bernie Madoff. Dale Miller -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html -- John McKown Maranatha! -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
Re: Our community strengths
On 10/25/2011 7:36 PM, Dale Miller wrote: OK, so we squabble, and disagree, but it is my belief that this community has in its membership many of the giants who built a technological marvel that underpins our society today, or at least would do so if management could be induced to extend its event-horizon beyond the current fiscal year, and to start counting real costs. Most of us have plied our trade in an environment where an unplanned outage or functional failure were simply not to be allowed. Because we built systems to perform well and reliably, we were invisible, except when we made mistakes. I'm sure I'm not alone in experiencing the almost-every-day complaint from a clerk in a store that 'the computer isn't working right today'. I believe that we should be getting the word out that computers don't have to act this way, and that we know how to build systems that behave properly. We certainly face an uphill battle against the mind-set among management that leads them to set unreasonable requirements for job descriptions and set the salary schedules far below current going rates. It really gets my goat that they use these machinations to spread the lies that they cannot get skilled IT personnel. See http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052970204422404576596630897409182-lMyQjAxMTAxMDIwNDEyNDQyWj.html?mod=wsj_share_email . I retired when I could no longer put up with the asininity of company politics, but if I wanted to continue in my chosen career, I would certainly undertake to build my skills in database, communications, and UNIX, however distasteful that might be. I could go on for hours about the poor design features of UNIX and current email and internet protocols, but if I needed a job, I would swallow my pride and start hitting the books. Of course, with the current political climate regarding Social Security and Medicare, I might have to go back to work. Perhaps I should have made larger private investments, but then maybe I would have invested in Enron, AIG, Lehman Brothers, or Bernie Madoff. Dale Miller You'd think IBM would be interested in telling the story. But, sadly, that doesn't seem to be the case. I have been after many IBM'ers to launch an effort to win the hearts and minds of people in IT and to raise the level of awareness of mainframes (especially z/OS) in the general public. But they don't seem to care about it: they are either hopelessly lost or they have a future plan that does not include z/OS. -- Kind regards, -Steve Comstock The Trainer's Friend, Inc. 303-393-8716 http://www.trainersfriend.com * Special promotion: 15% off on all DB2 training classes scheduled by September 1, taught by year end 2011 * Check out our entire DB2 curriculum at: http://www.trainersfriend.com/DB2_and_VSAM_courses/DB2curric.htm -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
Re: Our community strengths
I'd vote for the latter. Maybe the new CEO will set us straight. _http://www.eweek.com/c/a/IT-Infrastructure/IBM-Names-Virginia-Rometty-as-Ne w-CEO-635855/_ (http://www.eweek.com/c/a/IT-Infrastructure/IBM-Names-Virginia-Rometty-as-New-CEO-635855/) In a message dated 10/25/2011 9:36:15 P.M. Central Daylight Time, st...@trainersfriend.com writes: don't seem to care about it: they are either hopelessly lost or they have a future plan that does not include z/OS. -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
Re: Our community strengths
Hi Steve, I frequently run into people who remember the IBM ad about the servers being stolen, but they have really been consolodated onto the one mainframe. There weren't any follow on ads about how well that worked out for the company, nothing with the worried and frightened looking boss happliy going over the balance sheets, looking good at the customer meetings, getting promoted for his vision, winning recognition in the local community for going green. I am often reading one of th e fine manuals on transit and when folks look curious, we chat. Most say that they thought that the mainframe was gone now - they don't hear anything more about it. They are always surprised to hear about some of the mainframes here, in my area, and the kind of work they do. That IBM ad seems to be the last thing that many of the public has heard about mainframes. For all of the efforts any of us make, if the public isn't informed, and encouraged, they aren't going to go to work and talk about how they heard, saw, read that mainframes were more reliable, better suited to critical services, etc. With the z196 and z114 now in play, where are the marketers? It is insufficient for t hem to market only to the relative few who already know. The Super Bowl is coming soon. I'm hopeful, but I'm not holding my breath. Thanks, Linda - Original Message - From: Steve Comstock st...@trainersfriend.com To: IBM-MAIN@bama.ua.edu Sent: Tuesday, October 25, 2011 7:32:51 PM Subject: Re: Our community strengths On 10/25/2011 7:36 PM, Dale Miller wrote: OK, so we squabble, and disagree, but it is my belief that this community has in its membership many of the giants who built a technological marvel that underpins our society today, or at least would do so if management could be induced to extend its event-horizon beyond the current fiscal year, and to start counting real costs. Most of us have plied our trade in an environment where an unplanned outage or functional failure were simply not to be allowed. Because we built systems to perform well and reliably, we were invisible, except when we made mistakes. I'm sure I'm not alone in experiencing the almost-every-day complaint from a clerk in a store that 'the computer isn't working right today'. I believe that we should be getting the word out that computers don't have to act this way, and that we know how to build systems that behave properly. We certainly face an uphill battle against the mind-set among management that leads them to set unreasonable requirements for job descriptions and set the salary schedules far below current going rates. It really gets my goat that they use these machinations to spread the lies that they cannot get skilled IT personnel. See http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052970204422404576596630897409182-lMyQjAxMTAxMDIwNDEyNDQyWj.html?mod=wsj_share_email . I retired when I could no longer put up with the asininity of company politics, but if I wanted to continue in my chosen career, I would certainly undertake to build my skills in database, communications, and UNIX, however distasteful that might be. I could go on for hours about the poor design features of UNIX and current email and internet protocols, but if I needed a job, I would swallow my pride and start hitting the books. Of course, with the current political climate regarding Social Security and Medicare, I might have to go back to work. Perhaps I should have made larger private investments, but then maybe I would have invested in Enron, AIG, Lehman Brothers, or Bernie Madoff. Dale Miller You'd think IBM would be interested in telling the story. But, sadly, that doesn't seem to be the case. I have been after many IBM'ers to launch an effort to win the hearts and minds of people in IT and to raise the level of awareness of mainframes (especially z/OS) in the general public. But they don't seem to care about it: they are either hopelessly lost or they have a future plan that does not include z/OS. -- Kind regards, -Steve Comstock The Trainer's Friend, Inc. 303-393-8716 http://www.trainersfriend.com * Special promotion: 15% off on all DB2 training classes scheduled by September 1, taught by year end 2011 * Check out our entire DB2 curriculum at: http://www.trainersfriend.com/DB2_and_VSAM_courses/DB2curric.htm -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html -- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu
