On 02/20/2013 08:58 AM, John Gilmore wrote:
Shmuel is right, and this thread is symptomatic.
Before dual-case devices became available the use of single-case ones
was clearly defensible because inescapable.
The defense of the continued use of single-case ones once dual-case
replcements had become available, notionally on economic grounds, was
in fact an instance of the all but reflexive responses of
bureaucratized EDP managements to new technology.
They opposed providing every programmer with his or her own terminal:
terminals were not needed all the time; they could be shared, as
keypunches had been. They opposed the use of color terminals,
describing them as costly frills. They opposed the use of non-impact
printers, IBM or Xerox. They oppose the modernization of ancient,
creaky applications: If it ain't broke, don't fix it. I could extend
this litany ad infinitum et nauseam; but my point is, I hope, made.
The mainframe and its software are superb vehicles, but most of their
facilities go unused, at least directly, in most shops. (It is true
that they get some indirect use becauxe ISVs use them under the
covers.)
The deeply conservative, reactionary in the literal sense, managers of
most mainframe shops oppose the use of new technology because they
perceive it to be disruptive; and of course it is, but those who
reject it are first left behind and then, all but certainly,
displaced.
I am not at all sanguine about the long-term survival of the mainframe
outside a few niches. It should do, but most of the managers of
mainframe shops are preoccupied with preserving the comfortable,
familiar past. They are, predictably I suppose, curators and not
innovators. Worse, the young, who smell this, confound organizational
malaise with technical obsolescence.
John Gilmore, Ashland, MA 01721 - USA
...
The bit about resistance to personal terminals, etc. brings back
memories of the late 1970's & '80's. My recollection was that adamant
opposition to color terminals was partly because those also supported
graphic images, and there was a fear that anything that allowed use of
images would inevitably cause CPU, storage, memory, and channel costs to
explode exponentially. But, in fairness to our DP Managment, it was the
corporate management and managers of major corporate subsidiaries that
footed the DP bill that demanded tight constraints on the DP budget.
The DP management was financially conservative because that was the
policy dictated from above.
The trick is to establish the right balance between conservative versus
progressive management. A smaller competitor prided themselves on DP
"innovation". Their DP shop had the latest in multiple automated tape
silos and multiple mainframe laser printers, all of which we had also
considered but couldn't justify. Their corporate family became
financially distressed in the early 1990's and was bought out by ours,
and we ended up disposing of their expensive mainframe, silos, and
printers! On the other hand, one had to be progressive enough to be
positioned in hardware and software to take advantage of new
technologies when they provide cheaper alternatives or enable business
expansion.
--
Joel C. Ewing, Bentonville, AR jcew...@acm.org
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