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In this Issue |
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From the Editor: |
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by Edward Hurley, Editor
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What do college professors, firefighters and airline pilots all have in common? They are all professionals who are unionized.
Mainframe workers have been slow to embrace unions. Market forces, rather than collective bargaining agreements, have guaranteed mainframe pros have constant work at good pay. But developments such as offshore outsourcing have changed things. All of a sudden, a COBOL developer in Boston who makes say $30 an hour has to compete with a developer in Bangalore who would do the work for much less.
I must say that I am not advocating for unionization of mainframe shops but I just wonder why it is not at least part of the discussion. Have you ever seen that cheesy bumper sticker that said "Unions: The people who gave you the 5 day work week." I have heard from several mainframers who work much more than that. Seemingly, shops are trying to get by with fewer people when workers retire or leave.
There is definitely a perception issue when it comes to unions in the US. They seem the domain of blue collar people such as plumbers, auto workers and coal miners. White collar workers don't need or want the protections and restrictions that being part of a union brings.
Do you think mainframe workers are white collar workers? Blue collar workers? Or something in between? Would you be interested in joining a union? Why or why not? Let me know your thoughts on the topic by clicking here
Take our mainframe unionization poll! You can find it here.
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Featured Topic: |
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JCL for newbies
by the editors of Search390.com
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Simply put, job control language (JCL) is a language for describing jobs in the mainframe environment. This week's Featured Topic offers a wide variety of content for both JCL newbies and pros alike.
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Read more about this topic
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Expert Technical Advice: |
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Featured Expert Phil Emrich
Senior Consultant, Vanguard Integrity Professionals
Categories:CICS
As a member of Vanguard's Professional Services consulting team, Phil
provides a range of security related consulting services to
Vanguard's clients, as well as training and client support for
Vanguard's suite of software to enhance security policy enforcement,
administration, and auditing for z/OS mainframe centric clients using
the RACF component of IBM's Security Sever of z/OS. Many of the
consulting engagements Phil undertakes have to do with z/OS
middleware including CICS, WebSphere MQ, and DB2. Phil has over 36
years experience in the information technology industry, spending 31
years with IBM in a variety of capacities, providing technical
consulting and technical product support to IBM customers and their
local IBM'ers and guidance to IBM software development laboratories.
His technical expertise includes IBM's OS/390 and z/OS versions of
IBM's Security Server (RACF), all of the versions of IBM's Customer
Information Control System (CICS), IBM's cross platform messaging
software, WebSphere MQ (formerly MQSeries), IBM's Information
Management System (IMS), and IBM's DB/2 relational database software, as well as expertise in programming languages for IBM's S/390 and z/OS systems, including assembler language. Phil is a frequent speaker at SHARE and IBM technical conferences in the U.S., and also at conferences and seminars in Europe, Australasia, and the Far East, as well as the Enterprise Security Conference and EXPO sponsored by Vanguard each of the past 18 years.
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View all of Phil's answers
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In case you missed it: News and advice from the previous week
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Mainframe Mishap: Making a small problem a huge one
We have all done it. When trying to solve a small problem, we end up
causing a disaster. In this latest Mainframe Mishap, Jim Wilson
recounts just such a story.
>> HSM diagnostics
A Search390.com user asked Mark Zelden, our OS/390 and z/OS systems programming expert:
I have an HSM CDS that used to have six HSMs in an HSMplex, but now each HSM runs in its own LPAR with its own CDS. The original CDS still has a BCR and DCR record in the BCDS for each host in the old HSMplex. How do I get HSM to delete these records? Or, can I use FIXCDS delete to safely get rid of them? The BCRs and DCRs require memory and cycles to maintain.
>> Securing a CICS screen
Can you secure a CICS screen that is called by the application
program? Phil Emrich, our CICS expert, explores this question in this
tip.
>> Monitoring tape mounts
A Search390.com user asked Mark Zelden, our OS/390 and z/OS systems programming expert:
How can I tell, by using SMF records if a mount was specific or nonspecific? The assumption of output mount = scratch (nonspecific) is not true anymore as there are lots of products managing their own tape pools and issue specific mounts for output (like DB/2 for example). |
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Site Highlights |
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Crash course: Offshore Outsourcing
Take a look at some of the complex issues of outsourcing and get a better understanding of this controversial issue.
Click here
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Service-Oriented Architecture for Business Process Transformation
This White Paper provides an overview of SOA concepts and benefits, and why SOA is gaining traction in enterprise IT.
Check it out
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Solve The Integration Puzzle With SOI
Take a look
This paper examines how Service-Oriented Integration (SOI) creates an environment that connects systems internally as well as with vendors, partners, and customers.
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