john gilmore wrote:
Ted MacNeil WRITES:
REPEAT AFTER ME!
SMP is your friend!
SMP NEEDS statement numbers.
SMP certainly uses SNs and IEBUPDTE in some contexts. Equally, it
omits to use them in others where it could do so.
It never needs to use them, and it would be well if it had stopped
doing so long ago. Affection for obsolete technology is
understandable, even beguiling; but it is counter-productive.
This is just not true! There is nothing obsolete about the use of
sequence numbers when creating an SMP/E usermod. With this technology,
it's possible to write a modification to the behavior of a program
without distributing the entire program. This does two important things:
a) it decouples the modification from past and future updates
(enhancements, bug fixes, etc.) that might be made to the module by its
owner (e.g., IBM) and b) allows distribution of such modifications via
public fora or other similar public channel without violation of the
owner's copyright.
For example, here is the popular public usermod that provides multiple
TSO/E logon for JES3 installations.
|++USERMOD(UMJES06) /*
| ************************************************************
| * *
| * Multiple TSO Logon *
| * *
| ************************************************************
| */ .
|++VER(Z038) FMID(HJS7708)
| .
|++SRCUPD(IATGRJS) .
|./ CHANGE NAME=IATGRJS
| B MSSCH030 ACCEPT MULTIPLE LOGON UMJES06
38244010
Though IBM has implemented many unrelated updates to IATGRJS over the
years, this usermod has continued to work unchanged and is expected to
do so until no longer needed. And this is just one of hundreds, if not
thousands, of similar usermods being maintained all over the world by
various people for various reasons.
If serial numbers were no longer present in source-maintained program
products, the z/OS community would require a replacement technology.
For example, if z/OS provided a pervasive and universally accepted
method of describing the differences between two nearly-identical source
members (e.g. as some sort of "delta deck" -- pick your own term), and
a procedure for *reliably* applying the changes represented by that
"delta deck" to a source program (that BTW might have changed
substantially since the "delta deck" was first generated), then we could
do away with sequence numbers and I would agree they are obsolete.
Until then, sequence numbers can be called ugly, inconvenient, a PITA,
(insert your favorite pejorative). But they are most-certainly *not*
obsolete!
--
Edward E Jaffe
Phoenix Software International, Inc
5200 W Century Blvd, Suite 800
Los Angeles, CA 90045
310-338-0400 x318
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.phoenixsoftware.com/
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