On 7/3/2013 12:11 PM, Kirk Talman wrote:
There have been several various good answers to this problem.
As a certified alte kacker, I would like to comment on what this tells us
about the state of mainframe IT.
- Apparently one can be in "Operating Systems Support" w/o having been an
application programmer. One of the advantages many of us older persons on
this list and in the industry have is that we have "seen it before". The
idea that a person working in any technical job on a mainframe would not
know what a S0C7 is and how to go after it is amazing to me. At one time
there were machines w/o packed arithmetic, but now, apparently, training
in system administration functions is considered adequate. Who on this
list learned the majority of what they know via instruction? Most people
learned most things by doing. The work we do is a craft, part art, part
science.
- The idea in this day and age of not having a tool to give diagnostic
information when an abend occurs may indicate a lack of understanding by
management, but is still amazing. IBMs Fault Analuzer is not, I think,
expensive but is quite adequate to the task even in complex
CICS/DB2/IMS/MQ environments. If I were told there were less expensive
products available, I would not be surprised.
- On the other hand, I recently had to modify a program older than the
company. In code and macros I saw names of persons now high level
managers. The code had a S0C7 recovery section that was miscoded because
invalid assumptions were made about the effect of ignoring records causing
the abend. And the people who "own' the code were reluctant to fix the
root cause even when the fix was spelled out for them. They finally did
so only when embarrassed publicly.
- The best education comes while acquiring scars and observing same in
ones peers.
Hmmm. Well, the education with the biggest impact on memory and
behavior comes that way. But 'best'?
It might be better if one were educated to create applications
that worked correctly, how to use the avialable tools most
effectively, how to find and fix errors.
The best way to get that is being taught by an excellent mentor
who knows the way the company's code works and who can explain
things clearly and patiently.
After that, ahem, I would suggest a well-designed class that
demonstrates techniques for design, coding, testing, debugging
and maintenance. Such a class might even be designed to almost
force the students into making errors along the way - fixing
problems in the context of a training environment instead of
production. At least a little bit like 'real life'.
But, of course, I'm biased that way.
--
Kind regards,
-Steve Comstock
The Trainer's Friend, Inc.
303-355-2752
http://www.trainersfriend.com
* To get a good Return on your Investment, first make an investment!
+ Training your people is an excellent investment
* Try our tool for calculating your Return On Investment
for training dollars at
http://www.trainersfriend.com/ROI/roi.html
IBM Mainframe Discussion List <[email protected]> wrote on
07/03/2013 07:10:18 AM:
From: "Mowry, Norma E CIV DISA ESB (US)" <[email protected]>
To: [email protected],
Date: 07/03/2013 07:11 AM
Subject: Question on how to debug S0C7 (data exception) abend
Sent by: IBM Mainframe Discussion List <[email protected]>
We have a production job that is abending with S0C7 reason 00000007.
I set a slip to capture a dump but I can't seem to find the input
record that is causing the S0C7 in this dump. I also have a CEEDUMP
but that's not real helpful in diagnosing the issue. I looked a
setting a slip with a trace but don't think that will do any good to
get to the problem record.
Norma Mowry
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