Back in the 7090 era I read the code for FAP, and it sorted the symbol table using a binary radix sort bearing the comment "This is the world's best known test of the sense indicators." I thought that the code was really slick, and these days I would have called it k3wl.
The slickest thing that I saw in OS/360 was code testing successive bits using BXH and BXLE. Yes, access to assembly listing of the system made life much better. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz http://mason.gmu.edu/~smetz3 ________________________________________ From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU] on behalf of Brian Westerman [brian_wester...@syzygyinc.com] Sent: Tuesday, November 1, 2022 12:46 AM To: IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU Subject: Re: End of several eras I agree, I can't possibly convey how much I learned from some old IBM fiche that I had access to in the computer center when I just started college. The first really important thing I wrote (I was 17) were mods to pass the condition codes from step to step within JES2 and then send the highest one to the console and syslog at job end. I later learned that others had done the same thing, and long before me, but I learned a lot. That code didn't work with the first version of MVS I was exposed to after college, so it was followed by doing that same thing with two jes exits and then even later writing our companies Automation software that pulls the condition codes from the same fields they were placed in originally way back then. Everything I have written over the years is still based on concepts and techniques that I first learned by looking at the code in the IBM fiche. I had an extra advantage in that I worked for IBM throughout that same time and was able to see some truly spectacular coding techniques and I am truly thankful for that opportunity. I realize that IBM wanted to keep nefarious people from copying the code, but I think that we lost a great deal of experience and expertise when we lost access to the code. Some of those techniques are just not around for people to examine and learn from, and that's very sad. Brian On Mon, 31 Oct 2022 19:42:50 -0400, David Spiegel <dspiegel...@hotmail.com> wrote: >Hi Tom, >1983, eh? >The same year as the (expletive deleted) OCO policy. >I've seen IBM-lifers defend it on this forum, yet, it still did not/does >not make sense. > >Regards, >David > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
