>But given the resources at their disposal (and without making any comments on the current inventory levels of returned z900s) it would be easy for IBM to >put up a well.configured z900 doing precisely this.
>I think there would be marketing capital in it, too. "See, we've given every keyboard jockey who can get to a phone unlimited access to MVS - and none of >them have broken it yet." >Unless, of course, it can be broken. >It's incredibly difficult to get concepts like this through at IBM because at every turn you have to make a business case to a manager whose incentive >program is different to the manager that let you get to him. I think this argument is oversimplifying the issue. If it were simply a matter of a CPU and an operating system, then perhaps it wouldn't be so difficult, but it involves considerably more than this. Consider that not all z/series processors support all the instruction sets, so immediately that restricts some assembler language uses. What subsystems should be installed? CICS? DB2? Who supports all this stuff? What about configuring the network (TCP/IP & VTAM)? Does this also "promote" the MVS knowledge? Where does the DASD come from? Tape access? How are USERIDs assigned? Security? If not, then what happens when somebody clobbers YOUR data sets? Who will handle the SMP/E? Who will ensure that somebody else doesn't simply corrupt the operating system since the data sets are accessible for modification? Of course if all the normal security processes have to be in place to protect the integrity of the environment, then we are certainly not dealing with a simple implementation and it certainly couldn't be made available to just anyone with "access to a phone". In short, the issue of supporting a bunch of unknown users is neither trivial, nor cheap. In fact, a strong argument could be made that every systems programmer with a "sandbox" LPAR already has his/her system. Anyway ... My two cents Adam ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 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
