On Mon, Mar 23, 2015 at 1:06 PM, John Ehrman <[email protected]> wrote: > Paul Gilmartin noted... >> IMO, HLASM syntax is the most god-awful piece of clap-trap garbage I > have >> ever laid my eyes on. Well, perhaps a close second to JCL. > > HLASM's syntax is a direct descendant of the assembler languages for a > great variety of earlier systems, including the IBM 650, 704, 709(x), > System/360 etc. The one novelty in the System/360 assembler language was > the introduction of a separate, distinct class of variable symbols; > previous assemblers used ordinary symbols as macro variable symbols. At > the time the 360 was being developed, there were no low-level high-level > languages (PL/S and C came years later); what else was available for > building systems? And you'd be truly repelled by the language used on the > early IAS machines; by comparison, HLASM's is a model of simplicity and > clarity. > > I'm not defending historical clap-trap, but perhaps we're living too close > to the present?
I know that I need to watch myself on that score. There is a big problem with the desire to advance versus the desire to continue to use what already works. As an example, look at some of the posts in IBM-MAIN about COBOL 5 requiring that the executable be in a PDSE and impossible to run from a PDS. Lots of people yelling like somebody ran over their pet dog. But, at the same time, others are yelling for 64 bit AMODE. Can't win for losing. I sometimes get that myself: "You can change anything you need to. So long as it does not impact anything." Huh? Not just "negatively impact", but make any change that might be noticed and complained about by _anybody_. So I play with z/OS UNIX because I'm the only user. And I still cuss myself out. [grin]. The only enhancement that I, personally, would like would be for "free format" input into HLASM with _no_ line limits. Mainly because I keep my HLASM source in a UNIX file and, depending on "things", I use the "as" UNIX command to assemble it. I'm a bit of a UNIX partisan for "interactives". Being forced to use column alignment when I use a non-ISPF editor is a royal bother. Hum, it would also be nice if the tab character were a white space character outside of literals. > > John Ehrman -- If you sent twitter messages while exploring, are you on a textpedition? He's about as useful as a wax frying pan. 10 to the 12th power microphones = 1 Megaphone Maranatha! <>< John McKown
