Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 12:36:25 +0000
From: John Duffy Subject: MVS Systems Programmers... A Dying Breed?
Hopefully this will stimulate some conversation in this news group. Over the past few months, I keep hearing comments that revolve around
a similar theme. Comments like, MVS is an apprenticeship trade. MVS
is not taught in the Universities. No more MVS trade schools. I've
also heard, from IBM'ers that all the old Systems Programmers are
retiring. Hinting that there could be a shortage in Systems
Programmers in the future. Also that college graduates in Computer
Science have no MVS background. Thus creating a massive training
curve for someone who has always worked in a PC or UNIX platform and
now has to learn JCL? Has anyone seen this type of trend? So since most Colleges and Universities don't offer MVS course content
could this be a problem for businesses who rely on MVS for there day
to day business operation? How does this problem get solved? Do
businesses see this problem? I recently attended a Educational seminar at IBM where it seemed like
they were begging Colleges and Universities to get back to the
mainframe (CMOS) and enhance curriculumns to teach more MVS content.
Has enyone else seen this? I've recently installed OEMVS and sunk my teeth into UNIX. It's nice
and there are alot of commands to remember but when you get right down
to it, not a real big deal. I attended a presentation on the R390
platform with lots of UNIX folks in the room and every time the
instructor mentioned SMPE or RMF or IPS/ICS, the UNIX folks raised
there hands asking what these acyronmns meant. I chuckled then
realized that these folks have a long way to go. So how does the industry handle this problem? How do Systems
Programmers face this problem? I'd love to hear some feed back. I believe it's sort of like the huge tanker that has to start a left
turn some 5 miles before the turning point. The only thing that may
gum up the works is the cost of software on the new CMOS platforms.
The vendors have to realize that their prices must be competitive with
comparable UN* platforms in order for MVS to survive. I recently tumbed through a continuing education catalog and noticed
that every mainframe-oriented course is removed and replaced by UN*,
C++, OO, etc. I heard the success rate for projects that move the mainframe apps to
other platforms is quite low. Based on what's happening here, I could
believe it. The most popular UN* cry for a solution seems to be "reboot". I will try to be brief. Treat the following as a bulleted list: IBM's Architecture is evolving to reduce amount of work sys progs need
to do. Downsizing, reengineering, data center consolidation, mergers and
outsourcing, etc, etc. New recruits, comp sci grads, etc are lured by the 'latest' technologies
- ie client/server, object oriented, etc. Comp Sci courses do NOT include MVS. Mainframe systems constantly referred to as legacy (= they work) ensures
a negative impression on likely entry level candidates. Lack of training offered. For various reasons, lack of time, because of
downsizing, no money because it is all spent on the 'latest'
technologies. There are probably other reasons. But I agree with another responder
(Rick Tsujimoto) where he he says Training Companies (NOT US) have let
their mainframe curriculum wither. Personally, I don't want that to
change because our business has never been better, because we remained
focused on CICS, DB2 and other MVS topics, and will continue to do so. I'd love to start an entry level training program for sys progs! Interesting topic. I look forward to other input. Cheers, We have now passed the massive movement to manage by magazine. The
mainframe
is not dead. In fact, with the new CMOS boxes and OS/390
packaging/pricing,
large transaction servers are cheaper on the mainframe, with far more
integrity (2 phase commit) than UNIX can offer. Suddenly, SMP jockeys
are
more in damand, but so are highly specialized peformance and assembler
coders. The market is growing again. I am a dinosaur that survived. We were talking abou this at work recently. I think IBM is (intentionally
or not) trying
to replace sysprogs with sysjanitors who will come in and empty a new
ServerPac
onto the DASD once every 12-18 months. My thoughts are that no matter
how much
they try to make install and maint easier, *someone* will have to know and
truly
understand the underlying products.
By the way, I still have at least 20 some years before retirement so there
are still a
few of us 'younger' people left. I just hope that site attrition doesnt
leave me with
noplace to work in 15 years. Business, looking beyond the next quarter or fiscal year? When will that
happen? They should do what DEC did in the 60's-70's, Give the darn boxes away.
I believe that many of unix bigots today were developed in college. Think
of it.
A ready made crop of grads every year who know nothing but unix. The net
effect is a workforce who can see no solution for computing problems that
does
*not* involve Unix. Motto: "When all you have is a hammer, everything is a
nail" And the amazing thing is, they think Unix is just as mature as MVS by doing my job the best I can. And being convinced that there are some
things
that only MVS can do. Unix has many good purposes too. Both platforms
have
their purposes. The real difficulties arise when one side (or both sides)
puts on
blinders. I too, have been wondering about the education aspects of this career
path. IBM mainframes, in todays times, seem to be this dying platform waiting
to be replaced, by something "newer", "better", and "more user friendly". It's true, MVS has never had a pretty face, but MVS design goals have been
based upon "reliability", "availability" and "serviceability". I hate to
use those old (20 years) IBM marketing terms, but isn't this the type of
technology that banks, insurance companies, and retail industries RELY upon? The design criteria for *IX operating systems, although in many respects
is technically sound, did not have these basic business needs in mind. I have managed an MVS installation for 11 years. I have done development
in both the *IX environment, and the mainframe environment. I AM biased
towards the mainframe environment, and I have run into some interesting
serviceability issues. On MVS, if your program abends, you get a dump. The dump, although
sometimes voluminous, usually has what you need to fix the problem. If a
program is looping, you can take a console dump, or cancel the address
space with a dump. (if you have a storage overlay, it's all yours) Trace
table, RTM2WA's, register save areas, and now stacking PC information all
helps in pinpointing the problem, without having to wait for multiple
failures, or making code changes or patches to trap a bug in the user
environement. Although all *IX environments are not alike, generally speaking, when a
program abnormally terminates, you get a machine readable "core" file.
This is helpful, but only if the "core" file is examined with the
debugger on the exact same release of the operating system. I have only
found simple traceback information available from these core files with
any consistancy. Except for SUN (and I can't remember if it was Solaris, SunOs or both),
you would be lucky if you can find a facility that comes close to those
MVS offers for tracing events (GTF, VTAM, SLIP, etc.). The number of aids available to the MVS systems programmer (many that I
did NOT mention) and the reliablity of the IBM hardware environment, has
always made it an easy for me to provide a stable, reliable environment,
that can store and retrieve mass quanities of information. I sleep well at night knowing my bank is using IBM mainframes. It's too
bad the education facet of the computing industry doesn't focus upon the
strengths of this operating environment. System programmers are indeed a breed that seems destined to wither
down to limited numbers. I think
there will always be sys progs. Even if only in supplier companies.
The developers must have bodies like
this to develop new features. The "clients" as such will be left with
as someone called "sys janitors" to
throw in the odd serv pack. I personally miss the good old CBIPO and
struggle to install. That was the
only way to learn the product. I think the problem comes from
automation and the increase demand on
"faster, better in less" time attitude of the business world. My guess is that most large shops migrate the sharpest application
programmers into the Tech Service area (Systems Programming). These
would be people that already have a good working knowledge of the shop
and how things work and how things get done. Once there, the education is two-fold. Part A is OJT; mentoring from
the existing staff, and part B is good old IBM. They still teach
everything about their systems and probably have the best staff to do
it. There is also a part C, but this requires some additional
commitment from the employer. That is, GUIDE, SHARE and IBM Tech
Conferences. These user get-togethers are the single most important
activity a systems programmer can participate in. The contacts made
with other professionals, both users and vendors, is invaluable.
Unfortunately there are a lot of employers who think they can spend
their money more wisely elsewhere. IMO they are wrong. Those are not only my feelings, but that's the way I did it.
It seems like a lot of shops are cutting back on the money spent in this
area by hiring consultants, usually retired se's, and not having to pay
the benefits. We bought one of the CMOS boxes and apparently signed
agreements that said we had to have ESA 5.1, then OS/390 rel 2 installed
by certain dates. This gained us some discounts on the pricing, I guess,
but puts a lot of short deadlines on the systems area. We then bring in
the consultant to get it in by the contract date.
With IBM going to the short life of releases and packaging them with
OS/390, it helps them to not have to support the old stuff as long but
forces us to keep up.
We don't have the luxury of being a large shop. We have three people in
the systems area. We support MVS, CICS, VTAM/NCP with a statewide
satellite network(Texas), and all the third party products. We don't get
to specialize. By having to keep up with current releases, we don't have
time anymore to dig deep into the products. Just lay them down, get the
bugs out and turn them over. We don't get to use the finer points of the
products unless we hear something or learn about them at a class. We also
have less time for those.
When I started doing installation systems programming in 1983, my
company had already been hiring 3 system programmers trainees a year for
the previous few years. These were people that in some cases had done
application programming, and in other cases (like me) never saw a // JOB
card before in my life. We had little effective formal training from
the company, and managed to learn the trade mostly by struggling and
watching the more experienced people. At least in this company, it was
an apprenticeship even back then to learn the basics. To learn more
than the basics, you had to strike out on your own and risk making some
mistakes. The ones who went to the next level were the ones who learned
from their mistakes and the mistakes of others.
When I went to school in '78, part of the curriculum was a 360 assembler
class (using a DEC simulation). But even in that time-frame most
students seemed afraid of assembler. I think I was one of a small
minority that even finished all the projects. It was as if many people
didn't want to learn the bits and bytes - they just wanted to tell the
computer what to do with high-level languages and installation
procedures like A:SETUP (i.e ServerPac).
But then maybe we've unwittingly forced IBM and other vendors into this
"we can do without the system programmer" mode. After all, how many of
us have called IBM with a problem, only to find out it's that usermod or
exit we put on? That kind of stuff must drive them crazy, so of course
the only way out is to try to develop some kind of standard,
easy-to-maintain system, and try to hide the inner works with OCO.
The last few years have shown our management that the client/server
environment hasn't been all they expected, so there's been a resurgence
in the mainframe. But how long can this last? Sooner or later those
little boxes running Unix or NT or OS/2 are bound to take over. I've
done some Visual Basic and Windows C programming, and it's amazing what
those things can do, especially if attached to a giant server (maybe a
mainframe). Someday the small boxes will have the integrity and
security of a mainframe (many ideas copied from us of course!), and be
able to do the work that we do today with batch and CICS. They really
do copy us though - one thing that always amuses me is when I hear that
client/server is now headed toward the 'network computer' in order to
minimize the maintenance needed on the client end. Didn't we already
have that with a 3270 dumb terminal :) ? But then I wouldn't give up my
cut & paste or type-ahead for anything!
Bottom line - I think the mainframe has had a short repreive, but it
can't last for long. People teaching must already see this, and
although they don't know exactly when the last mainframe will be shut
down, it's hard to get people into a class that even slightly appears to
have no future.
How can a company handle this? Pay more for the few people left that
really know the business (I'm not implying I'm one of them), or head
toward an environment that is currently being taught, which can be risky
in some cases for critical applications.
Tom Brennan
Southern California Edison Co.
P.S. If you're looking for installation system programmer training, I'm
a very good part-time teacher and I need money for diapers (not my own,
I'm not that old yet :)
A few comments on the death of systems programmers:
The mainframe has proved difficult to kill. Among the reasons are:
1. Extremely robust
2. High I/O bandwidth
3. Supports thousands of users
4. Cost effective (at least recently)
5. Excellent support from IBM
6. System Security
Although one can surmise that other platforms will catch up soon,
consider that Unix is nearly as old as MVS. Some look towards NT as
a long term solution, but NT is proprietary (arguably more so than
MVS which can run POSIX compliant applications) and Microsoft hasn't
demonstrated it can step up to enterprise support the way IBM does.
Also given the importance of mainframe business to IBM, IBM will do
everything in it's power to keep the mainframe viable. Finally,
mainframes will make sense for a long time to come because it is
inherently easier to manage a few things than to manage a bunch of
things.
The original thread pertained to MVS systems programmers. Sysprogs
were a dying breed that is experiencing a renaissance. Even today
new and improved tools threaten to eliminate the MVS sysprog, but
remember back to the early days of systems managed storage. One of
the perceived benefits was the reduction or elimination of systems
programmers. To a large degree that objective had been met. The
sysprogs are gone - replaced by storage administrators. (A rose by
any other name .....).
The issue of sysprog training/education was raised. As one of
the MVS Cluster Leaders at SHARE, I'd recommend SHARE as a good place
to start. If you have attended SHARE and believe there are some topics
we should cover but don't, send me an email. If you would attend
SHARE if we offered other sessions, let me know what they are.
Interestingly we used to have an MVS New User's Project, but it was
disbanded due to a lack of new MVS Users. Perhaps it should be resurrected.
Bob Shannon
shannon@programart.com
For the record, I should mention that our university, Northern
Illinois University (located in DeKalb, Illinois, 60 miles west of
Chicago), has offered an MVS-centered computer science curriculum for
many years. Our computer science students continue to submit COBOL,
FORTRAN, and BAL programs to our MVS mainframe for execution (using
the MVS TCP/IP FTP interface to JES2). We have classes which teach
the basics of JCL and CICS. Aside from some SMP/E in one
graduate-level class, we don't focus on MVS systems programming per
se, but we do give our students a good start in becoming MVS
applications programmers. Some of us, including myself and several of
my co-workers, even end up becoming MVS systems programmers. :-)
If anyone is interested in learning more about our Department of
Computer Science, I recommend that you check out
Dave
Dave Ulrick, Systems Programmer Internet: d-ulrick@niu.edu
Northern Illinois University
DeKalb, IL, USA
Before it was New Users, it was the MVS Conversion Project (I think).
That name would be very apt as we reach out for recovering UNIX sites.
Cheers,
Steve
It is dying all right.
I have been an MVS & CICS system programmer for the past 13 years.
There are few things to clarify here before we proceed:
1. We, as system programmers, are interested only with the Mainframe
Software Platform. Not the hardware. The question is how long will the
MVS/CICS/COBOL/DB2 environment continue to exist.
The classic mainframe is already gone.
2. The CMOS mainframes are capable of running Unix (MVS Open Edition
that seems to interest nobody). IBM announced that they will soon run NT
(probably as a process within MVS). A mainframe which is running NT is
not a mainframe (from our professional point of view).
3. The main issue is Application Software Development not system
programming. RAD (Rapid Application Development) tools are by far better
on the PC then anywhere else.
4. Mainframe as SERVER? I believe we can set up a robust environment
which will give Cost/Performance ratio better then any mainframe IBM
could set up (The non-mainframe systems are stable (Commercial Unix),
Fast (SMP machines based on RISC/Pentium processors), got tons of
memory, and are connected via fast I/O channels). IBM could not beat
such systems even at the high-end.
5. So, Why do we use them? Mainframe are good ONLY for running the
legacy code written for them in the past 30 years (which costs more then
all the hardware in the world).
6. Look around you. Did you see whole NEW projects targeted at the
Mainframe Environment which were initiated in the past 2-3 years? In
the sites I have been with, mainframe applications are being only
maintained.
7. The real thing that ties an organization to a platform is the
application. A mainframe as a SQL server (MVS/DB2) could be replaced
with, relatively, small effort by other SQL servers (UNIX/NT/ORACLE).
Applications written in a certain environment, and functioning, will
last to its expected life cycle (7-p10 years) no matter what technology
will emerge (simply, application environments are NOT compatible in any
sense).
8. Cheer up. The Mainframe with MVS will probably bury us all. However,
If you are looking for interesting work (rather then
financially-rewarding one) you will have to look somewhere else. It is
rather quite in the MVS system programming department .
Yishay Yovel.
Bobby Herring wrote:
It seems like a lot of shops are cutting back on the money spent in
this
area by hiring consultants, usually retired se's, and not having to
pay
the benefits.
I recently made the overwhelming switch from developing (CICS,DB2 and
COBOL) into systems. OJT was something my mentor said would be the most
valuable tool he could provide. I said, "buy me an IBM education card",
so on my year anniversary that's what I got. With only three systems
people including myself I have to become an expert in all the areas
that ESA/ OS390 has to offer. I can't wait for 5/10 years of head
crashes, DB2 troubleshooting, CICS performance issues to mold me into
a "SYSTEMS MAN" or can I? One thing that has become very clear during
the last 15 months is that you do not learn systems in the short-run.
The classes that IBM offers are very good snap shots of what you need to
know; being able to apply what is taught requires an understanding that
can only come from hard knocks. As mentioned by another thread to this
topic,
management/society does not like long term solutions to short-term
budgets. It might become the responsibility of each shop to develop this
talent or is that the original question? Sometimes I wonder if all this
effort will provide for a long career in a downsizing market?
P.S. What is systems programmers? I bet that position has changed over
that past 20 years.
--
Craig Otway
MVS/S390 Technical Support
Education Service Center Region 10
400 E Spring Valley
Richardson, Texas 75081
972-231-2582 x456
Death and taxes? So what, guess us moldie-oldies have a slightly different
perspective from the a:setup crowd. It's just a stage of maturation of
insecurity and self-doubt that's probably better addressed on some
psyco-babble list. Just go with what brung you! Inquisitivness, ingenuity,
flexibility, determination. Things change, people change-some for the
better some for not. Industry changes as trends changed, right now it's
the day-to-day bottom line stuff that's in vogue so the market just dropped
1600 points-the pendulum will swing the other way. 499 of the Fortune 500
use MVS(HP doesn't). Would you use your Porsch to haul fire-wood? Depends
on how cold it is. Where's it going? Don't have a clue but I do enjoy the
ride(no Nissans either)!
EDWARD J. FINNELL,III(EFINNELL@UA1VM.UA.EDU)
MVS/Proj. Mgr.
http://www.ua.edu
I don't want to burden the group again by telling you that I am looking for
Systems Programmers but the gloominess of Yishay's message struck a chord.
I dare anyone of you to put your resume on the Internet and await the phone
calls. I am working on requirements that involve new development as well as
maintenance. The people working on these project are in some case making
close to six figures. I just left a company that claimed the world of
Mainframes is dying like that of the dinosaurs. As someone working on 15-20
openings every day for experienced mainframers, I beg to differ.
Thanks Mike,
I myself am experiencing a difficult time finding 'mainframers' to fill
the staff.
Our 'old, defunct, dinosaur' mainframe is growing and we are preparing
to
add additional S/390 MIPS (50% increase over the next 9 months).
Based upon what we have learned until now, it would be difficult (and
very,very,
expensive) to replace mainframe capacity, scaleablity and performance
with
alternative platforms and still mantain a high performance environment
supporting
hundreds of concurrent users.
Systems Programmers are not dying (unless they themselves decide to) but
are
transcending the 'mainframe software only platform' to include hardware
technology
and directions. Operating systems such as UNIX are not replacements to
MVS but
are complimentary operating system environment which, like MVS, serves
to
satisfy business requirements. Data centers of the future could easily
house both
UNIX, NT and MVS systems, all interconnected to share data and the new
breed
systems programmers will need to understand more than just MVS.
Register my vote for the resurrection of the MVS New User's Project.
I am not long out of college where I was brought up on the other side of
the
fence (C, VB, UNIX, MS Windows). I am now in the position of needing a
good
grasp of MVS but I have found it almost impossible to understand the MVS
arena due to lack of introductory material.
I would welcome any initiative that enables the new college graduates
like
myself to try and fill the shoes of those who are moving on.
Craig Harris
craig@waters.net
This sounds like a good point in the discussion for an IBMer to 'step up to
the breach'. I seem to remember many (too many!!) years ago several
manuals, or were they SRA books, that were aimed at people just like Craig
Harris. They were introductory in nature, and covered Hardware, MVS basics
& JCL, access methods etc...
Perhaps one of the IBM readers of this list may like to research what is
currently available - and share it with the list. After all, I am sure it
is still in IBMs best interest to foster MVS education.
Regards - Neil.
Neil Stenlake - Technical Consultant
Capacity & Storage - Westpac Banking Corp
Sydney Australia
An introductory source...
I received Robert H. Johnson's "MVS: Concepts and Facilities" as
soon as I stepped through the SP door. My first assignment was
reading it cover to cover. My copy is a little dated now (1989)
but still contains a lot of useful introductory concepts.
There's probably fresher releases out there, and it's a decent
place to begin the learning curve.
If MVS is dying, why are there so many job listings for MVS
systems guys in my NASPA Technical Support magazine each month?
And before you jump ship, consider that jobs listings indicate
(to me at least) that to make 6 figures in one of the other
client-server environments, you have to be an executive type and
actually run the IS department or at least manage a fairly large
number of people. Whereas to make 6 figures in the MVS world,
you just have to be very, very, very good with your technical
skills. If you're anything like me the prospect of managing
others holds no interest, and the nuts and bolts aspects of the
job are what draws you to it. So if you're technically driven,
MVS seems to offer the most lucrative rewards for that pursuit.
Don'tFlameMeIDontWannaFight,
Tom
I also claim eh???? I have the ICSS server runing under OS/390 Ver
2.
and it will
beat the pants off of *ANY* unix box Ive seen. Weve got some *HUGE*
sun
boxes in
house, and this little 9672-RC4 probably can out sent any of them.
Also, what about the Lotus Notes/Domino port for OS/390??? Even if
IBM's claims
1/3 as good as they seem to be (10000 notes users-->to 3000 users), the
biggest notes
servers we have, start sweating if they get over 500 users cranking away
on them.
And as a side note, this OS/390 Ver 2. system is running under
VM/ESA!!!
(Isnt that neat??? A V=R guest beating up on a stand-alone
SUN box...)
Tanx....(just my 2 cents worth on this old and dying thread)
Remember, your fathers mainframe ain't what it used to be!!!!!!!
This one deserves a blow-by-blow:
On Sat, 5 Apr 1997, Yishay Yovel
Not from what *I* see. I just returned from a conference of MVS software
vendors. It was the largest attendance ever, partly due to the added
UNIX software vendors who are anxious to port their wares to OS/390.
OE interesting nobody? See above.
OS/390 running NT code? One of the strengths of a mainframe is the ability
to run a variety of workloads -- and, all at the same time. I recently heard
a story about a computer facility where the mainframe (now CMOS) had shrunk
down to a corner of the room, only to be replaced by a farm of disparate
"servers," and the customer was pleading for help in sorting it all out.
It seems IBM is going after that business by moving the server work onto
the mainframe, where the customer knows it would become manageable.
I write mainframe *assembler* code and I LOVE to do it on my PC. The
platform is perfect for the task. But, of course, the code only runs
on the mainframe.
I've heard similar statements before, but I've yet to hear about any
UNIX hardware or software vendor who has successfully replicated an
MVS environment with a full mix of transaction processing, batch,
database, time sharing, FTP, web-serving, etc. workloads all running
at the same time, and has even come close.
IBM's installed base of mainframe MIPs increased by 49% last year alone.
I know that the "legacy" [read "they work"] systems have had increases
in the amount of data they need to handle, but I understand that is more
10% to 15% per year. So, *somebody* must be writing new code to require
all those new MIPs.
At the high end, I think the thing that ties an organization to a platform
is the life of its business. For decades, MVS developers have been guided
by the concepts of RAS -- Reliability, Availability and Servicability.
The culmination of their efforts is OS/390 Parallel Sysplex -- *designed*
to run 24x365. The people running large companies -- and those running
smaller companies that they want to grow into large companies -- just
don't want to bet their business on anything less. The "I don't know what
happened, let's just re-boot" approach to problems that seems to pervade
the UNIX/NT community just doesn't measure up.
As a software developer, I've written programs for Windows using VB, C,
and C++. After a while, though, these languages get pretty b-o-r-i-n-g.
On the other hand, 390 assembler never seems to let me down when it comes
to offering some intellectual stimulation of one kind or another.
Hello All,
I thought it was about time I put in my penny's worth (except where I am
and have been over the last few years the penny has really died out).
Been sysprogging since 1980 - contracting since 1988....never been out
of work...it is still there if you look..
But over the last four years have installed 5 CMOS boxes, and been
involved in installing OS/390 in three different sites. In one of the
sites we replaced a very aging UNIVAC system!
Currently employed in a site where they claim to have grown from "5
MIPS" to "550 MIPS" in the last 6 years...they started on DOS and became
MVS very quickly...still growing with very strong growth forecast....all
on MVS..
I have found the support for the CMOS boxes paired with RAMAC style DASD
and cartridge tape units to have been the renaissance of MVS shops. It
must be the removal of all that weight of copper cable from machine
rooms.
So here is my vote that MVS sysprogs will continue to have a very strong
career ahead.
Best wishes to all the pessimists.
Bruce Hewson
working in Singapore.
An extra point..
I have stopped using the term LEGACY whenever I speak to management or
clients....I now use the term HERITAGE....which in my area has a poitive
aspect while LEGACY has a negative aspect.
So I say that MVS / OS/390 is the best place to run your HERITAGE
systems
Regards
Bruce Hewson
In 1978 Gene Amdahl pointed out in a presentation to employees that
people were predicting the death of the mainframe because of the wide
spread use of mini computers (remember those?). Gene's observation was
that these doomsayers failed to understand that mini computers could
collect data faster than people could (terminal users), resulting in the
need for ever yet larger mainframes to manage the data.
Move a typical mainframe dasd farm to UNIX and see what happens.
UNIX doesn't have RACF and it doesn't have SMS.
--
---
Wayne L. Beavers mailto:wayneb@beyond-software.com
Beyond Software, Inc. http://www.beyond-software.com
"The Mainframe/Internet Company"
Art, Well said, but reality will prove that the world eventually would
drop the CICS/DB2 world on behalf of more advanced (if not, yet, robust)
environments.
Yishay Yovel.
Yishay Yovel wrote:
Original messaged snipped.
What do you mean by 'more advanced' and how do you justify your
conclusion - that the world will drop CICS/DB2? From the many clients we
provide training to, the opposite is the case!
--
John Wynton
Senior Account Manager
Themis Education Services
http://www.themised.com
1. My response to Art was in relation to his response to my initial view
about the MVS sysprogs issue.
2. I will try to elaborate on my view.. Basically, I argue that IS is
driven by applications and not technology and that the new applications,
nowdays, evolve mainly on non-mainframe platforms (in that I mean the
software platform not the hardware).
3. The reasons for that are:
a. Functionality (mainframe online appliocations are by far less
functional then PC-oriented applications).
b. platform-oriented third party development (their are relatively few
software vendors developing solutions for the mainframe (this is
changing, to late, with p/390 platform).
3. Take a look at one of the hotest topics of todays IS business: Data
Warehouse. Data warehouse tools are targeted at non-mainframe platforms
where the mainframe should have been an ideal choice. Why? You can set
up powerful environments that are cheaper then a mainframe. Your
product will be scalable (you could run it on NTs or various Unix
machines and porting should be rather easy). It would not require
specialized skills to develop, install and maintain the product in a
non-compatible mainframe environment.
4. we could go on like this. My conclusion remains: The mainframe is
only good for running its legacy, non compatible, non-portable
applications. The new stuff is going someplace else.
Yishay Yovel.
This thread is getting kind of interesting...
Then how come head hunters cannot seem to find enough mainframe people
to fill
the current employment need.
Also, go to http://www.s390.ibm.com and read the new little blurb
from an independent consulting company on the mainframe .vs. unix vs. NT
war.
Mr. Yavel wrote something in an earlier thread about I/O speed on these
"NEW"
client/server boxes. There is nothing (even as we speak) that comes
close to ESCON
speeds on a mainframe. (Even UNIX consultants will admit that). Go
talk to some
UNIX consultants once. They do things better then Mainframes, and
Mainframes do
things better than UNIX....
It can be a happy world...Look at Open Edition...Its happy...(ha ha)
One person's opinion here, of course, but the mainframe has been dead,
for about 10
years now. Hmmm...what have we all been drawing a paycheck from for the
last
10 years....
Tanx for listening.....jt(ee)n
This thread is getting real interesting...Never tell Mainframe
people their dead after
they have known it for 10 years. But don't tell the recruters, they
haven't found out
yet. Or so I have heard. (Check the job ads and see whats hot and
whats not)
Anyway, dinosaur's can now do JAVA!!!!! Pretty good for a dead box....
One person's opinion, and its my own....tanx jt(ee)n
1. Please put aside this recruting thing.
2. About 10 years ago I was involved with a site running CDC mainframes.
That was the only CDC mainframe in Israel and probably there are
no more left in the world today. The last person in Israel that
was familiar with CDC operating system made a fortune.
3. The inability to hire people is due to the fact that MVS
knowledge cant be acquired at the universities. There are very few
young people
who will go, after graduation, to learn a platform they know
nothing about and which the hi-tecxh industry almost disregard.
4. Since some us retire or change careers a gap is created.
The dying mainframe is still has to be maintained and since it
runs missiom-critical appliocations you would like to have
experienced guys running your system dept.
5. The last one to throw the switch on the last MVS box is going to
be rich ... and old.
Yishay Yovel.
P.S - I have been a mainframe sysprog (MVS and CICS) for the past
13 years. I am still waiting to be convinced by siginificant
arguments and not external factos (like jobs).
Front end applications, maybe... everyone is going GUI.. but back end??? I think
not. You use whatever is appropriate for the job. The MF is just another
server on the network now... We *just* got DB2!!!! There is no other platform
right now that can handle the volume of data we have to deal with... 10 years
down the road, the answer might be different, but right now there is only one
answer.
See above... front ends are going GUI/PC, BIG data *isnt*.
Tell that to CA! (Actually, they bought em all!)
Why? You can
Tell that to Platinum & Oracle!
In case you haven't looked lately, the MF is becoming very much like those boxes
you are talking about above. And, uh, no specialized skills? Puleeeese!!!!
Yes, the new user interfaces are going somewhere else... the huge gobs of data,
security and stability are not moving anywhere for now....
Jim
*standard disclaimer* just my own opinion.. etc...
back to lurk mode...
Bruce Hewson
It's only a matter of time before "Heritage" will have the same
negative connotations as "Legacy". After all, what could be
nicer than leaving a "legacy"? It was considered polite once.
- seb
The latest edition of Datamation on the cover asks: Are the Mainframes Cool
Again?
A few additional thoughts here, as a kind of a general response to
some of the other follow-on posts:
1. I believe the mainframe business will stay vibrant *indefinitely,*
simply because of the caliber of the people involved and their
commitment to delivering top-quality, competitive solutions. They
are the best in the business and *that's* why they make the big
bucks.
2. It may seem like the mainframe lags behind other platforms in one
technology or another, but a closer look would reveal that once a
technology is proven truly worthwhile, it shows up on the
mainframe in its most robust form (e.g. fiber optics, RAID, etc.)
3. Yishay responded to my original rebuttal by saying, "...but
reality will prove that the world eventually would drop the
CICS/DB2 world on behalf of more advanced (if not, yet, robust)
environments." There's a dozen ways I could come back on this,
perhaps following up along the lines of (2) above, but let's con-
sider just one "more advanced" feature that is unique to the
mainframe: Parallel Sysplex. It is remarkable technology and
since it's now maturing and being deployed in more data centers,
the kind of scaleability it provides will become more and more ob-
vious. The UNIX/NT world has nothing like it, and I suspect it
won't for a very long time.
4. I'll agree with Yishay on the fact that there are a lot more new
applications being developed for PCs. I think it's a natural
evolution. I seem to remember from many years ago when I did some
3270 work, specifying a "numeric-only" field, so that the terminal
did some "data validation" for my host program. Fast-forwarding
about 20 years, the PC is the ideal means of offloading the
obsequious task of interfacing with the dumb user and validating
every little thing he/she enters. If that process involves GUIs
and mouse clicks and drop-down lists that make the user a happier
camper, then great! What's happening, though (as suggested by
Wayne Beavers with his story about Gene Amdahl) is that it's still
creating MORE work for the mainframe. Once the merchandise order,
medical history, insurance claim, etc. is "clean" at the PC, good
business practice behooves moving the data to a more reliable,
secure platform. Therefore, most serious new applications
developed for PCs include a "back office" component. And, for
those "bet-your-business" applications, companies will want the
*most* reliable, *most* secure host there is, which, of course, is
a mainframe.
5. The biggest problem facing the mainframe industry today is getting
it to grow faster. Most mainframes are owned/leased by larger
companies, and each year, there just aren't all that many com-
panies crossing over into the "larger" category, and buying their
first mainframe. IBM, of course, has been taking steps to expand
the lower end of the mainframe market. P/390 and Multiprise have
brought the low-end cost down to where it's competitive with the
higher-end UNIX boxes, but there's still the problem of systems
programming, which is two-fold: (1) There aren't enough ex-
perienced SPs to go around, and (2) it's hard to justify a full-
time SP is a small shop. So, I think the effort underway to make
it easier to install and maintain OS/390 is mostly targeted for
this market segment. For the larger shops, I suspect the buttons
and dials that SPs are good at tweaking will stay there, so they
can continue to get the most from their big systems. But, to
penetrate the low end, we really need a "manifestation" of the
operating system that installs in a snap and runs well right out
of the box. Also, while there hasn't been a lot of talk about it
just yet, I believe the ISVs have to do the same kind of thing
with their OS/390 products, for the same reasons.
Legacy implies something that has died and is willed to the next
generation.
The mainframe is dead, NOT!
I prefer the term "CLASSIC" as the mainframe environment has always been
of the highest quality.
From the CrossPlex Concepts and Facilities Guide:
"Keep in mind the term LEGACY means something of great value left for others
to use in new ways."
---
Wayne L. Beavers mailto:wayneb@beyond-software.com
Beyond Software, Inc. http://www.beyond-software.com
"The Mainframe/Internet Company"
There another reason, I think, why mainframe isn't dead and will stay
alive long.
It's nice to have GUI front-ends. but with pc and distributed data and
distributed programs you have more troubbles in application development
than benefits.
you have to care about the location of data and if you want i.e. reports
from the whole enterprise, you must gather the data from 50 or more
locations (depending on your program organizations).
on the other hand you have as many copies of your program, as pc's exist
with all problems we know (distribution of programs, different hardware
and software on evry pc, already detected errors)
This situation can be cleared with intranet-solutions. you have one copy
of your program, the data you transmit via line is not much more than
with classic 3270-applications. you can widen your network of your
company without large investments and application development is rapid.
to keep your data and applications in a central place the mainframe is a
fine thing. You can drive reports worldwide with not more than 1 SELECT
and you have all your data consistent.
in MVS you have all components you need for such solutions (security
included), your environment (hardware, software and MANPOWER(a good team
is a lot worth )) and IBM makes a lot of efforts to support this market
too.
So - i think - the mainframe will go back to a similar situation as with
3270, before pc. Data will be centralized, applications are reduced to
nice screens, the overhead of pc-administration will be reduced and the
intranet (or internet) will solve some problems, workstations brought
us.
and the cost of DP will be reduced. (Cost of dp developed from average
1,5% of revenue in the early 80's to (in some companies) 8 to 10% with
workstations and a lot of servers and 1.000's of licences). and cost is
the central argument.
--
mit freundlichen gruessen / with best regards
Josef Werner Boeck
j.w.boeck@t-online.de
All right Art!!
I think the discussion takes a few odd branches. The "mainframe"'s (ugh!
how I hate that word!) future is solid for all the reasons you and
others have cited. (I prefer to think of "OS/390 platform" as the name
for the hardware configuration.) The system programmer, however, is and
has been an overhead factor in many installations, nevertheless often
doing heroic work to supplement what the stingy operating system vendor
refuses to implement [correctly].
In the area I care about, performance management, the need for the
sysprog declines dramatically with the implementation of Workload
Manager goal mode. Instead of worrying about such arcana as paging rates
and MPLs, the person responsible for setting up performance parameters
actually has little more to do than talk to the real customers or
consult the service level agreement if there is one. As the subsystems
sign up for advanced levels of WLM management, the even more specialized
CICS and IMS wizards will also have to look for honest work.
The basic work of establishing an efficient system configuration and
ensuring that it is maintained as workload grows will continue, but that
is not in my mind system programming. It's more like
performance/capacity with accountability.
Today's environment just does not tolerate obscure mods or neat hacks
that tend to retard currency. Too much is happening in OS390!
Steve Samson (speaking for himself)
Schmegacy, schmeritage. Raise your hand if you know the answer to this one.
How many Lear jets does it take to obsolete a 747?
I would guess around 20. Its been a long time since I've been on a 747
(about 20 years). I think a 747 can transport 400 people and a Lear jet can
transport about 20 people. Also, I would guess that a 747 costs around 50
million and a Lear jet 5 million. As you can see a Lear jet is much
cheaper. Unless you do the math!
Not sure how to take your last sentence. This is *not* a math problem. If it
were, the world's airlines--who use lots of math to enhance profits--would
have converted their fleets decades ago. The Lear jet is a fine vehicle for
the purpose its designers intended, which was *not* mass transit. What do
you get when you replace a 747 with a bucketful of Lears? An army of
client-servers.
I think the anology is not so much comparing a 747 with Lears but rather a
Hercules transport plane with a Lear.
The IBM mainframe is an industrial-strength utility machine -- good for
hi-volume
batch and transaction processing but missing many of the frills of smaller
machines.
IBM has a unique opportunity of turning its Hercules into a 747 but is
progressing so
slowly and going in all the wrong directions that you may find one day soon that
it is
the Lear jets that turn into 747's rather than the Hercules.
(What do I mean by IBM progressing slowly or wrong direction?
There is was a big gap in the last few years when the smaller machines and their
OS's
could not compete with the IBM mainframe but IBM did not grab the opportunity to
quickly turn their mainframe into the user-friendly, developer-friendly
super-servers
that they had the potential to be.
The status of the mainframe now is that it is only a partial super-server -- you
need
a slew of additional software/hardware from IBM with an army of systems
programmers
and IBM consultants to get it working properly and afterwhich the poor developer
better have a Phd to be able to understand how to do the low level programming
that
IBM insists must be done before applications can be churned out. You can't do
RAD
developement with the IBM mainframe -- at least, not with the mainstream IBM
products.
Take a simple example -
DB2 v5 - it's not yet out and when it's out, it will still only provide very
primitive
ways of writing stored procedures (I believe the poor programmer still has to
manually
update the systems catalog to feed it with the meta-data on the parameters that
the
stored procedure will use); why can't IBM just steal a few ideas from the many
competitors that are already in the market - if it's a simple select statement
stored
procedure, then the DBMS can generate the update itself.
MQSeris - why try to make people convert to an entirely new architecture when
CICS is
already doing up to say 80% of what MQSeris is supposed to do for transactions.
(The
only justification I can think of in using MQSeris is in EDI-type
store-and-forward
transacations and even then, only if the comms infrastructure is bad or is a
road-warrior remote access type situation which is getting rarer nowadays now
that
comms infra is becoming so reliable worldwide
CICS Client - Here was a good product lying around for years; hardly publicised;
the
little bit of additional development that needed to be done to make it
developer-friendly not done until now and even then, there's still lots of
futher
improvements that can be made.)
Maybe MVS System Programmers are a dying breed.
Don't confuse being a Web Server for data with a Web Server for applications!
If all you want to do is display data (HTML, GIF, MPEG, JPEG, TEXT, etc.)
then it takes 11 minutes to install the software to do that, assuming that
you know how to code JCL. You don't need OS/390, you don't need Open Edition
and you don't need LE/370 either. All you need is an MVS/ESA Web server.
Enterprise Web/MVS can serve most any standard mime type.
Now, if what you want to do is display results of applications on the Web,
that is a little more complicated. Running applications (CICS, IMS/DC, VTAM,
TSO, ISPF, Roscoe, Wylbur, etc.) that access data in large data bases (IMS,
VSAM, IDMS, FOCUS, etc.) is an entirely different problem. In most of these
cases the data is going to have to be processed by a CGI program. Some one
is going to have to write those CGI programs. You can write them to run on
any platform. I recommend that you run your CGI programs as close to the
data as possible. For mainframe data bases that means run the CGI on the
mainframe and send the html to the browser.
Warning: My comments are very biased. I am one of the Enterprise Web/MVS
developers.
BTW my 11 minutes to install was for someone that has installed it before.
One of my customers installed it for the first time yesterday and it took
him 20 minutes. Several CGI's were in test mode the same day.
---
Wayne L. Beavers mailto:wayneb@beyond-software.com
Beyond Software, Inc. http://www.beyond-software.com
"The Mainframe/Internet Company"
Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 16:50:59 EST
From: Rick Tsujimoto
*---------------------------------------------------*
* Rick Tsujimoto *
* *
* rtsujimoto@cusa.canon.com *
* *
* tel: 516-328-4554 *
* fax: 516-328-4369 *
*---------------------------------------------------*
Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 17:57:08 -0500
From: John Wynton
Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 15:15:39 -0800
From: Bob Halpern
Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 02:03:55 GMT
From: Tom Longfellow
>
> So since most Colleges and Universities don't offer MVS course content
> could this be a problem for businesses who rely on MVS for there day
> to day business operation? How does this problem get solved? Do
> businesses see this problem?
>
> I recently attended a Educational seminar at IBM where it seemed like
> they were begging Colleges and Universities to get back to the
> mainframe (CMOS) and enhance curriculumns to teach more MVS content.
>
> I've recently installed OEMVS and sunk my teeth into UNIX. It's nice
> and there are alot of commands to remember but when you get right down
> to it, not a real big deal. I attended a presentation on the R390
platform with lots of UNIX folks in the room and every time the
instructor mentioned SMPE or RMF or IPS/ICS, the UNIX folks raised
there hands asking what these acyronmns meant. . I chuckled then
> realized that these folks (unix have a long way to go.
>
> So how does the industry handle this problem? How do Systems
> Programmers face this problem?
Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 22:06:20 -0800
From: Young
Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 08:25:20 +0200
From: POTGIETER NICO
Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 21:47:47 -0800
From: DLPolzin
Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 11:27:13 EST
From: Bobby Herring
Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 00:11:42 -0800
From: Tom Brennan
Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 10:06:18 EST
From: Bob Shannon
Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 14:08:20 EST
From: Dave Ulrick
Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 17:33:08 -0800
From: Steve Samson
Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 08:49:49 +0300
From: Yishay Yovel
Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 15:00:59 -0800
From: Craig Otway
Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 21:37:02 CST
From: "Edward(Ed) J. Finnell,III"
Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 11:26:26 +0100
From: "Mike G. Kalinsky"
Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 10:03:00 -0700
From: "Sissoyev, Michael - TPMXS"
Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 13:03:38 -0400
From: Craig John Harris
Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 17:41:24 -0500
From: Neil Stenlake
Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 14:25:51 -0400
From: Tom Hylton
Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 03:56:51 -0500
From: "Jim Nelson --- jt(ee)n"
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 00:02:17 -0400
From: Art Celestini
>It is dying all right.
>I have been an MVS & CICS system programmer for the past 13 years.
>There are few things to clarify here before we proceed:
>
>1. We, as system programmers, are interested only with the Mainframe
>Software Platform. Not the hardware. The question is how long will the
>MVS/CICS/COBOL/DB2 environment continue to exist.
>The classic mainframe is already gone.
>
>2. The CMOS mainframes are capable of running Unix (MVS Open Edition
>that seems to interest nobody). IBM announced that they will soon run NT
>(probably as a process within MVS). A mainframe which is running NT is
>not a mainframe (from our professional point of view).
>3. The main issue is Application Software Development not system
>programming. RAD (Rapid Application Development) tools are by far better
>on the PC then anywhere else.
>4. Mainframe as SERVER? I believe we can set up a robust environment
>which will give Cost/Performance ratio better then any mainframe IBM
>could set up (The non-mainframe systems are stable (Commercial Unix),
>Fast (SMP machines based on RISC/Pentium processors), got tons of
>memory, and are connected via fast I/O channels). IBM could not beat
>such systems even at the high-end.
>5. So, Why do we use them? Mainframe are good ONLY for running the
>legacy code written for them in the past 30 years (which costs more then
>all the hardware in the world).
>
>6. Look around you. Did you see whole NEW projects targeted at the
>Mainframe Environment which were initiated in the past 2-3 years? In
>the sites I have been with, mainframe applications are being only
>maintained.
>7. The real thing that ties an organization to a platform is the
>application. A mainframe as a SQL server (MVS/DB2) could be replaced
>with, relatively, small effort by other SQL servers (UNIX/NT/ORACLE).
>Applications written in a certain environment, and functioning, will
>last to its expected life cycle (7-p10 years) no matter what technology
>will emerge (simply, application environments are NOT compatible in any
>sense).
>8. Cheer up. The Mainframe with MVS will probably bury us all. However,
>If you are looking for interesting work (rather then
>financially-rewarding one) you will have to look somewhere else. It is
>rather quite in the MVS system programming department .
>
>Yishay Yovel.
>
============== ,, ===========
Art Celestini @@- adc@galaxy.net (home)
Wyckoff, NJ < celestini@platinum.com (work)
PGP Pub Key at -'# IBMMAIL(USRWNZEN) --> MVS (work)
pgp.ai.mit.edu ### Favorite Site: www.tezcat.com/~smokers
============== ===========
Warning: Dates in Calendar are closer than they appear.
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 22:40:00 +0800
From: Bruce Hewson
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 23:07:55 +0800
From: Bruce Hewson
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 08:08:39 -0700
From: "Wayne L. Beavers"
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 23:32:29 +0300
From: Yishay Yovel
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 16:29:20 -0400
From: John Wynton
>
> Art, Well said, but reality will prove that the world eventually would
> drop the CICS/DB2 world on behalf of more advanced (if not, yet, robust)
> environments.
>
> Yishay Yovel.
>
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 00:47:34 +0300
From: Yishay Yovel
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 00:30:12 -0500
From: "Jim Nelson --- jt(ee)n"
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 00:38:14 -0500
From: "Jim Nelson --- jt(ee)n"
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:06:09 +0300
From: Yishay Yovel
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:00:04 -0500
From: James Harrison
>>> Yishay Yovel
>3. The reasons for that are:
>
>a. Functionality (mainframe online appliocations are by far less
>functional then PC-oriented applications).
>b. platform-oriented third party development (their are relatively few
>software vendors developing solutions for the mainframe (this is
>changing, to late, with p/390 platform).
>3. Take a look at one of the hotest topics of todays IS business: Data
>Warehouse. Data warehouse tools are targeted at non-mainframe >platforms
>where the mainframe should have been an ideal choice.
>set
>up powerful environments that are cheaper then a mainframe. Your
>product will be scalable (you could run it on NTs or various Unix
>machines and porting should be rather easy). It would not require
>specialized skills to develop, install and maintain the product in a
>non-compatible mainframe environment.
>4. we could go on like this. My conclusion remains: The mainframe is
>only good for running its legacy, non compatible, non-portable
>applications. The new stuff is going someplace else.
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 16:48:12 -0400
From: "Stephen E. Bacher"
>
>I have stopped using the term LEGACY whenever I speak to management or
>clients....I now use the term HERITAGE....which in my area has a poitive
>aspect while LEGACY has a negative aspect.
>
>
>So I say that MVS / OS/390 is the best place to run your HERITAGE
>systems
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 13:58:45 -0700
From: Lionel B Dyck
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 17:06:33 -0400
From: Art Celestini
============== ,, ===========
Art Celestini @@- adc@galaxy.net (home)
Wyckoff, NJ < celestini@platinum.com (work)
PGP Pub Key at -'# IBMMAIL(USRWNZEN) --> MVS (work)
pgp.ai.mit.edu ### Favorite Site: www.tezcat.com/~smokers
============== ===========
"Very funny, Scotty. Now beam down my clothes."
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 16:07:25 -0500
From: "Buschmann, Al"
Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 15:05:50 -0700
From: "Wayne L. Beavers"
Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 14:32:23 -0700
From: Josef Werner Bvck
Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 20:21:01 -0700
From: Steve Samson
Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 14:55:38 -0700
From: Skip Robinson
Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 10:10:06 -0400
From: Duane Jeirles
>>
>Schmegacy, schmeritage. Raise your hand if you know the answer to this one.
>How many Lear jets does it take to obsolete a 747?
>
Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 11:10:10 -0700
From: Skip Robinson
>>
>I would guess around 20. Its been a long time since I've been on a 747
>(about 20 years). I think a 747 can transport 400 people and a Lear jet can
>transport about 20 people. Also, I would guess that a 747 costs around 50
>million and a Lear jet 5 million. As you can see a Lear jet is much
>cheaper. Unless you do the math!
>
>
Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 08:35:54 +0800
From: Goh Boon Nam
Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 17:38:53 -0700
From: "Wayne L. Beavers"
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