Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[David Crayford]

On 17/3/23 22:41, Matt Hogstrom wrote:

Thanks for the information Lionel.  It’s good to share the efforts and let 
folks know.  Ideally, from my perspective, IBM should seriously consider adding 
an OpenTools offering in z/OS so customers do not have to piece meal these 
important tools.  My candidates would be:

bash
zsh
git
gzip
python (along with common packages)
virtualenv


I'm excited about the zsh shell. I use zsh with oh-my-zsh and 
Powerline10K on all my Linux systems. There is also a port of rsync 
which is awesome.




Have a package manager that would allow users to “install” them in their local 
user instance since everything is shared on z/OS.  Rocket did a nice job with 
Miniconda but it still more of a global solution.  I would expect the tools 
that are most important are those that are part of the CI/CD pipeline, app and 
infrastructure automation, etc.

My view is it would be nice if that the tools were available with the system 
and that they worked and didn’t turn into an easter egg hunt across projects 
and vendors … that hurts the platform; imho.

Matt Hogstrom
m...@hogstrom.org

“It may be cognitive, but, it ain’t intuitive."
— Hogstrom




On Mar 17, 2023, at 10:20 AM, Lionel B. Dyck  wrote:

I was just pointing out an alternative. Obviously if you need official support 
then IBM or Rocket are your only options right now.


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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[Dave Jousma]

On Fri, 17 Mar 2023 10:41:53 -0400, Matt Hogstrom  wrote:

>Thanks for the information Lionel.  It’s good to share the efforts and let 
>folks know.  Ideally, from my perspective, IBM should seriously consider 
>adding an OpenTools offering in z/OS so customers do not have to piece meal 
>these important tools.  My candidates would be:
>
>bash
>zsh
>git
>gzip
>python (along with common packages)
>virtualenv
>

They already do, but disguised.   If you are licensed for ADF/z (application 
development foundation), it comes with Rocket GIT SMPE packaged, in it there is 
perl, curl, bash.  

Python is orderable via shopz.  you can likely order it without S, so it 
should be a no cost item.

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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[Seymour J Metz]

I've used proprietary software with excellent support, and proprietary software 
with terrible support - from the same vendor.

I've used free software with terrible support, and free software with excellent 
support. I have nothing but good memories of the support for, e.g. IEBUPDTX, 
PDS,  anything from UOW (although the latter eventually morphed into 
chargeable, also with good support.)


--
Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz
http://mason.gmu.edu/~smetz3


From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU] on behalf of 
Dave Jousma [01a0403c5dc1-dmarc-requ...@listserv.ua.edu]
Sent: Friday, March 17, 2023 9:35 AM
To: IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU
Subject: Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

On Tue, 14 Mar 2023 09:09:11 -0500, Lionel B. Dyck  wrote:

>You no longer need to get the open tools for z/OS from Rocket Software -
>there is a new player in town - the z/OS Open Tools project.
>
>
>

Lionel,  As others have pointed out, the backend support is really the issue, 
not the quality of what this project is doing.   As a real life example, we 
have Rocket GIT client for our DEVOPS pipelines on the mainframe.   We get our 
support through IBM for it.   GIT V2.26.78 is working fine, but the 2 
subsequent ports, 2.26.84 and 2.26.87 have problems with code-page translation 
with Jenkins jobs.  the -87 port was supposed to have fixed the code-page 
problems introduced in -84, but didnt.  I have open case at this moment on 
that.   I, nor my team have the time to chase this down ourselves via community 
forum where everyone is looking for answers, but when there is a real problem, 
its crickets.

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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[Matt Hogstrom]

Thanks for the information Lionel.  It’s good to share the efforts and let 
folks know.  Ideally, from my perspective, IBM should seriously consider adding 
an OpenTools offering in z/OS so customers do not have to piece meal these 
important tools.  My candidates would be:

bash
zsh
git
gzip
python (along with common packages)
virtualenv

Have a package manager that would allow users to “install” them in their local 
user instance since everything is shared on z/OS.  Rocket did a nice job with 
Miniconda but it still more of a global solution.  I would expect the tools 
that are most important are those that are part of the CI/CD pipeline, app and 
infrastructure automation, etc.   

My view is it would be nice if that the tools were available with the system 
and that they worked and didn’t turn into an easter egg hunt across projects 
and vendors … that hurts the platform; imho.

Matt Hogstrom
m...@hogstrom.org

“It may be cognitive, but, it ain’t intuitive."
— Hogstrom



> On Mar 17, 2023, at 10:20 AM, Lionel B. Dyck  wrote:
> 
> I was just pointing out an alternative. Obviously if you need official 
> support then IBM or Rocket are your only options right now.


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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[Lionel B. Dyck]

I was just pointing out an alternative. Obviously if you need official support 
then IBM or Rocket are your only options right now.


Lionel B. Dyck <><
Website: https://www.lbdsoftware.com
Github: https://github.com/lbdyck

“Worry more about your character than your reputation. Character is what you 
are, reputation merely what others think you are.”   - - - John Wooden

-Original Message-
From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List  On Behalf Of 
Dave Jousma
Sent: Friday, March 17, 2023 8:35 AM
To: IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU
Subject: Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

On Tue, 14 Mar 2023 09:09:11 -0500, Lionel B. Dyck  wrote:

>You no longer need to get the open tools for z/OS from Rocket Software 
>- there is a new player in town - the z/OS Open Tools project.
>
>
>

Lionel,  As others have pointed out, the backend support is really the issue, 
not the quality of what this project is doing.   As a real life example, we 
have Rocket GIT client for our DEVOPS pipelines on the mainframe.   We get our 
support through IBM for it.   GIT V2.26.78 is working fine, but the 2 
subsequent ports, 2.26.84 and 2.26.87 have problems with code-page translation 
with Jenkins jobs.  the -87 port was supposed to have fixed the code-page 
problems introduced in -84, but didnt.  I have open case at this moment on 
that.   I, nor my team have the time to chase this down ourselves via community 
forum where everyone is looking for answers, but when there is a real problem, 
its crickets.

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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[Dave Jousma]

On Fri, 17 Mar 2023 08:35:18 -0500, Dave Jousma  wrote:

>On Tue, 14 Mar 2023 09:09:11 -0500, Lionel B. Dyck  wrote:
>
>>You no longer need to get the open tools for z/OS from Rocket Software -
>>there is a new player in town - the z/OS Open Tools project.
>>
>>
>>
>
>Lionel,  As others have pointed out, the backend support is really the issue, 
>not the quality of what this project is doing.   As a real life example, we 
>have Rocket GIT client for our DEVOPS pipelines on the mainframe.   We get our 
>support through IBM for it.   GIT V2.26.78 is working fine, but the 2 
>subsequent ports, 2.26.84 and 2.26.87 have problems with code-page translation 
>with Jenkins jobs.  the -87 port was supposed to have fixed the code-page 
>problems introduced in -84, but didnt.  I have open case at this moment on 
>that.   I, nor my team have the time to chase this down ourselves via 
>community forum where everyone is looking for answers, but when there is a 
>real problem, its crickets.
>

EDIT GIT 2.26.2

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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[Dave Jousma]

On Tue, 14 Mar 2023 09:09:11 -0500, Lionel B. Dyck  wrote:

>You no longer need to get the open tools for z/OS from Rocket Software -
>there is a new player in town - the z/OS Open Tools project.
>
>
>

Lionel,  As others have pointed out, the backend support is really the issue, 
not the quality of what this project is doing.   As a real life example, we 
have Rocket GIT client for our DEVOPS pipelines on the mainframe.   We get our 
support through IBM for it.   GIT V2.26.78 is working fine, but the 2 
subsequent ports, 2.26.84 and 2.26.87 have problems with code-page translation 
with Jenkins jobs.  the -87 port was supposed to have fixed the code-page 
problems introduced in -84, but didnt.  I have open case at this moment on 
that.   I, nor my team have the time to chase this down ourselves via community 
forum where everyone is looking for answers, but when there is a real problem, 
its crickets.

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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[Kirk Wolf]

Well, if you're vendors use open source then you could have a commercial 
license that offers warranties and indemnities that cover it.   We have offered 
that to our Co:Z customers for many years.

Kirk Wolf
Dovetailed Technologies
http://coztoolkit.com

On Thu, Mar 16, 2023, at 5:23 AM, ITschak Mugzach wrote:
> If so, ask your vendors not to use open source anymore...
> 
> ITschak Mugzach
> *|** IronSphere Platform* *|* *Information Security Continuous Monitoring
> for z/OS, x/Linux & IBM I **| z/VM coming soon  *
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, Mar 15, 2023 at 9:06 PM Matt Hogstrom  wrote:
> 
> > +1 … that is one of the biggest challenges for any tools.  Mainframe
> > customers (and even distributed) want provenance of code and a throat to
> > choke.
> >
> > Matt Hogstrom
> > m...@hogstrom.org
> >
> > How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg?  Four.
> > Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg.
> > - Abraham Lincoln
> >
> >
> >
> > > On Mar 15, 2023, at 12:50 PM, David Crayford 
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > The major difference is that Rocket offer enterprise support for their
> > open source tools which a lot of customers deem mandatory. YMMV.
> >
> >
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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[ITschak Mugzach]

If so, ask your vendors not to use open source anymore...

ITschak Mugzach
*|** IronSphere Platform* *|* *Information Security Continuous Monitoring
for z/OS, x/Linux & IBM I **| z/VM coming soon  *




On Wed, Mar 15, 2023 at 9:06 PM Matt Hogstrom  wrote:

> +1 … that is one of the biggest challenges for any tools.  Mainframe
> customers (and even distributed) want provenance of code and a throat to
> choke.
>
> Matt Hogstrom
> m...@hogstrom.org
>
> How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg?  Four.
> Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg.
> - Abraham Lincoln
>
>
>
> > On Mar 15, 2023, at 12:50 PM, David Crayford 
> wrote:
> >
> > The major difference is that Rocket offer enterprise support for their
> open source tools which a lot of customers deem mandatory. YMMV.
>
>
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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[Matt Hogstrom]

+1 … that is one of the biggest challenges for any tools.  Mainframe customers 
(and even distributed) want provenance of code and a throat to choke.

Matt Hogstrom
m...@hogstrom.org

How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg?  Four. 
Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg.
- Abraham Lincoln



> On Mar 15, 2023, at 12:50 PM, David Crayford  wrote:
> 
> The major difference is that Rocket offer enterprise support for their open 
> source tools which a lot of customers deem mandatory. YMMV.


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Re: Git, and other Open Tools, Alternative for z/OS

[David Crayford]

The major difference is that Rocket offer enterprise support for their 
open source tools which a lot of customers deem mandatory. YMMV.


On 14/3/23 22:09, Lionel B. Dyck wrote:

You no longer need to get the open tools for z/OS from Rocket Software -
there is a new player in town - the z/OS Open Tools project.

  


You can find them at https://zosopentools.github.io/meta/#/ and they offer
several different installation options from individual packages to a
generalized installation tool (zopen).

  


It's all on GitHub and they encourage participation, including via the use
of the new GitHub repository Discussions option - see
https://github.com/ZOSOpenTools/meta/discussions.

  


On their guild/project call last month one of the contributors mentioned the
ability to request formal support (that was the extent of that discussion)
in case your site requires it.

  


For Git they are more current than Rocket (2.26.2-78) with version 2.39.2
recently posted.

  


I have tested Git 2.39.1 and now 2.39.2 with ZIGI (see
https://github.com/zigi) with no problems.

  


As an example you'll find:

  


Bash 5.2

Bzip2 1.0.8

Curl 3.8

Git 2.39.2

Gzip 1.12

Less 608

Pcre2 10.42

Lua 5.1.5

Lynx 2.8.9

Openssl 1.1.1s

Perl 5-blead

Sed 629

Sqlite 598

Vim 9.0.0846

  

  

  


Lionel B. Dyck <><

Website:   https://www.lbdsoftware.com

Github:   https://github.com/lbdyck

  


"Worry more about your character than your reputation. Character is what you
are, reputation merely what others think you are."   - - - John Wooden

  



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