I'm sure that's the reason why the extended mnemonics have not traditionally been in there. But, as a mere user, I don't give a rat's ass about the internecine conflicts between the business divisions of IBM; I care only about how easy it is to access the information I need. Where they /deserve/ to be documented is where they make most sense from a usability standpoint.
And, as you so rightly point out, if they can put in the basic mnemonics, they /why not/ the go go the whole hog and clearly document the extended as well? i ------ Original Message ------ Received: 05:34 PM COT, 12/23/2013 From: Paul Gilmartin <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Latest PoO available? > On 2013-12-23, at 14:37, Ian S. Worthington wrote: > > > > Just seen this. So it is! > > > > Never seen that before. Have the architecture folks finally understood that > > the PoO is the main reference manual for coders, not the HLASM manuals, and > > quietly slipped it in the corner? Don't think they need to be /quite/ so > > reticent about it! > > > Clearly, the extended mnemonics are features not of the hardware, > but of the assembler, and deserve to be documented not with the > former, but with the latter. > > But can't the same be said of the basic mnemonics? After all, > the hardware defines only the binary opcodes; all else might be > considered properly the realm of software documentation. The > design should be based, however, on what's reasonable and useful. > > Originally, the operation code consisted of only the first 8 > bits of any instruction; bits elsewhere could be considered > modifiers of a single operation code with a single mnemonic > chosen by the hardware designers. Nowadays, that's far from > true. > > To muddle things further, the organization of the PoO implies > that the various associated RX, RR, SS, and SI forms are deemed > variants of a single instruction (but with distinct mnemonics). > Notwithstanding, regrettably, many releases ago the PoP outgrew > the capacity of Bookie and has since been available only in PDF. > I suppose it might just be considered ahead of its time. > > -- gil
