From: Steve Comstock <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> At the request of IBM we are developing training on how to use WebSphere Developer for zSeries (WD4z). As one of the labs we want the students to run a rexx exec. Since we are not under ISPF, edit macros are not an option. I thought I would use existing, available non-ISPF resources to get the job done, but it doesn't seem to work under this environment.
It's funny how things come around in circles. Many years ago I attended an in-house presentation given by IBM to one of my former employers. IBM was selling a product (I can't remember what it was called) that allowed mainframe programs to be developed on a PC. The product had some really cool features, including (for example) the ability to 'hilite' programs in different colors. This was before the ISPF edit HILITE command became available, so at the time it looked very impressive; much nicer than editing programs in a single color!
At the end of the session we started asking questions, and one of them was "Can I run edit macros?". The answer was "No, but if you tell us what kind of macros you'd like to run we can enhance the product to build-in whatever features you run in your macros". I can't fault IBM for giving that answer, but they had NO idea how extensive or site specific our edit macros were. There were hundreds of them, and more being developed all the time. We also had CLISTs and many other mainframe specific tools and utilities, including of course a number of third-party vendor products. The idea that if we moved our development to the PC we wouldn't be able to use these tools and utilities became a show-stopper.
Needless to say we didn't purchase the product and continued developing on the mainframe. Soon afterwards the edit HILITE command came along. As this had been one of the big draws for moving development to the PC, a lot of people found this quite amusing. It just brought it all back to me when you said in your email that because WD4z is not under ISPF, "edit macros are not an option". :-)
Dave Salt SimpList(tm) - The easiest, most powerful way to surf a mainframe! http://www.mackinney.com/products/SIM/simplist.htm ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
