Ah, JCL. It reminds me of a description I once heard... "like an
old case of the clap, to which one has become accustomed, and perhaps even
a little fond". You learn to live with it's oddities, make use of the
peculiarities when possible, and remember how hard it was learning the
first time. And think of the job security it brings.
But Paul Gilmartin is totally correct, It needs to be replaced.
But not fixed. Can you imagine how much JCL would fail if it started
working rationally? No, start from scratch, call it z/JCL (or whatever
comes after z) and go forward. JCL is older than most people who use it,
and such a conglomeration that repairing it is out of the question.
Some folks have advocated running all of your jobs under REXX
which does what JCL does, but much better. Only drawback I see is all
that TSO overhead. But it does provide an image of what JCL could/should
be. Of course, all of your job scheduling/ re-start programs would have
to be re-written.... Well, I am looking to do some consulting
post-retirement. Just to support my Renaissance music habit.
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