Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
-Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Mark Post Sent: Tuesday, November 23, 2010 2:30 PM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? On 11/23/2010 at 10:19 AM, George Henke/NYLIC george_he...@newyorklife.com wrote: Please tell ur laughing friends that GUI, *point and click*, is for people who can't type. If you really believe that, then I would like to hear your reaction after giving up your 3270 emulator and doing all your work from a 2714. Mark Post You still type in your 3270 emulator, you still have to know what you're doing. GUI's hide that from you Doug This communication is for informational purposes only. It is not intended as an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any financial instrument or as an official confirmation of any transaction. All market prices, data and other information are not warranted as to completeness or accuracy and are subject to change without notice. Any comments or statements made herein do not necessarily reflect those of JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates. This transmission may contain information that is privileged, confidential, legally privileged, and/or exempt from disclosure under applicable law. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the information contained herein (including any reliance thereon) is STRICTLY PROHIBITED. Although this transmission and any attachments are believed to be free of any virus or other defect that might affect any computer system into which it is received and opened, it is the responsibility of the recipient to ensure that it is virus free and no responsibility is accepted by JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates, as applicable, for any loss or damage arising in any way from its use. If you received this transmission in error, please immediately contact the sender and destroy the material in its entirety, whether in electronic or hard copy format. Thank you. Please refer to http://www.jpmorgan.com/pages/disclosures for disclosures relating to European legal entities.
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
That is an assumption or opinion, not necessarily a fact. For example, my wife may not know the operating system line mode commands, but she certainly knows the accounting systems that she uses via a GUI interface. In fact, the GUI represents an increase in productivity. I would suggest that if you do not know what you are doing, then you should not use either interface; if you do know, you should use whatever interface you choose. Rule Number 1 (Know what you are doing) applies. Regards, Richard Schuh You still type in your 3270 emulator, you still have to know what you're doing. GUI's hide that from you Doug
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
I think we can safely assume that since this discussion was about VM CMS that we're talking operating systems and interfaces to those OS's not applications as is your wife's case GUI's have their place, I personally do not believe that place is in an OS to manage it or it's subsystems where understanding what happens is very important. I know DNS admins who can't manage their servers without GUI's. That to me is ridiculous and are admins who need to understand more about what they manage. Are they more productive maybe, are they dangerous, I leave that to you Think of this, what happens to those admins if their gui breaks and all they have is command line. William 'Doug' Carroll -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Schuh, Richard Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 12:54 PM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? That is an assumption or opinion, not necessarily a fact. For example, my wife may not know the operating system line mode commands, but she certainly knows the accounting systems that she uses via a GUI interface. In fact, the GUI represents an increase in productivity. I would suggest that if you do not know what you are doing, then you should not use either interface; if you do know, you should use whatever interface you choose. Rule Number 1 (Know what you are doing) applies. Regards, Richard Schuh You still type in your 3270 emulator, you still have to know what you're doing. GUI's hide that from you Doug This communication is for informational purposes only. It is not intended as an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any financial instrument or as an official confirmation of any transaction. All market prices, data and other information are not warranted as to completeness or accuracy and are subject to change without notice. Any comments or statements made herein do not necessarily reflect those of JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates. This transmission may contain information that is privileged, confidential, legally privileged, and/or exempt from disclosure under applicable law. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the information contained herein (including any reliance thereon) is STRICTLY PROHIBITED. Although this transmission and any attachments are believed to be free of any virus or other defect that might affect any computer system into which it is received and opened, it is the responsibility of the recipient to ensure that it is virus free and no responsibility is accepted by JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates, as applicable, for any loss or damage arising in any way from its use. If you received this transmission in error, please immediately contact the sender and destroy the material in its entirety, whether in electronic or hard copy format. Thank you. Please refer to http://www.jpmorgan.com/pages/disclosures for disclosures relating to European legal entities.
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
I have multiple installations running Linux under z/VM where the z/VM sysprogs are very overcommitted. Allowing them to offload work that CAN be done by someone else makes them much more productive - as long as the work assigned is controlled by an authorization mechanism. Most of the work, even DNS admin functions are janitor work, or maybe even clerical (or management), why utilize a skilled person for those functions? But yes, every installation needs access to someone with skills, and I'd much rather have 10 new installations, sharing one sysprog than zero with great skills... William D Carroll wrote: I think we can safely assume that since this discussion was about VM CMS that we're talking operating systems and interfaces to those OS's not applications as is your wife's case GUI's have their place, I personally do not believe that place is in an OS to manage it or it's subsystems where understanding what happens is very important. I know DNS admins who can't manage their servers without GUI's. That to me is ridiculous and are admins who need to understand more about what they manage. Are they more productive maybe, are they dangerous, I leave that to you Think of this, what happens to those admins if their gui breaks and all they have is command line. William 'Doug' Carroll -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Schuh, Richard Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 12:54 PM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? That is an assumption or opinion, not necessarily a fact. For example, my wife may not know the operating system line mode commands, but she certainly knows the accounting systems that she uses via a GUI interface. In fact, the GUI represents an increase in productivity. I would suggest that if you do not know what you are doing, then you should not use either interface; if you do know, you should use whatever interface you choose. Rule Number 1 (Know what you are doing) applies. Regards, Richard Schuh You still type in your 3270 emulator, you still have to know what you're doing. GUI's hide that from you Doug This communication is for informational purposes only. It is not intended as an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any financial instrument or as an official confirmation of any transaction. All market prices, data and other information are not warranted as to completeness or accuracy and are subject to change without notice. Any comments or statements made herein do not necessarily reflect those of JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates. This transmission may contain information that is privileged, confidential, legally privileged, and/or exempt from disclosure under applicable law. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the information contained herein (including any reliance thereon) is STRICTLY PROHIBITED. Although this transmission and any attachments are believed to be free of any virus or other defect that might affect any computer system into which it is received and opened, it is the responsibility of the recipient to ensure that it is virus free and no responsibility is accepted by JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates, as applicable, for any loss or damage arising in any way from its use. If you received this transmission in error, please immediately contact the sender and destroy the material in its entirety, whether in electronic or hard copy format. Thank you. Please refer to http://www.jpmorgan.com/pages/disclosures for disclosures relating to European legal entities.
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
And then you have someone like me who finds typing to be burdensome due to a physical condition. If I had a GUI to manage the operating system, I would welcome it. One point I was making is that saying or implying that because someone prefers a GUI, they do not know what they are doing is a generality that has exceptions and is offensive. One can know how to do something using primitives and simply choose an easier method. It happens all of the time. It is why we have tools like Rexx and CMS Pipelines, for instance. I am familiar with machine instructions, but I do not write programs using them. The closest I have ever come to it (post IBM 601 days) is using Assembler. Does that make me stupid or a bad person? Does that imply that I don't know what I am doing? I think not. As for your example of the DNS admins, they should know their limits as well as their abilities. Rule number 1 applies - if you do not know what a command does, do not enter it; if you do not know what clicking on an icon does, do not click it. If you do not know how to do something, read the manual or help files or ask someone who does know. If you go beyond your limits, be prepared to pay the price. The same can be said of every user from end user to admin (including DNS admin); from system operator to systems programmer. I would rather have someone ask very basic questions than do something they shouldn't, something that causes harm to themselves or others, for lack of asking. Regards, Richard Schuh -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of William D Carroll Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 10:32 AM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? I think we can safely assume that since this discussion was about VM CMS that we're talking operating systems and interfaces to those OS's not applications as is your wife's case GUI's have their place, I personally do not believe that place is in an OS to manage it or it's subsystems where understanding what happens is very important. I know DNS admins who can't manage their servers without GUI's. That to me is ridiculous and are admins who need to understand more about what they manage. Are they more productive maybe, are they dangerous, I leave that to you Think of this, what happens to those admins if their gui breaks and all they have is command line. William 'Doug' Carroll -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Schuh, Richard Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 12:54 PM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? That is an assumption or opinion, not necessarily a fact. For example, my wife may not know the operating system line mode commands, but she certainly knows the accounting systems that she uses via a GUI interface. In fact, the GUI represents an increase in productivity. I would suggest that if you do not know what you are doing, then you should not use either interface; if you do know, you should use whatever interface you choose. Rule Number 1 (Know what you are doing) applies. Regards, Richard Schuh You still type in your 3270 emulator, you still have to know what you're doing. GUI's hide that from you Doug This communication is for informational purposes only. It is not intended as an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any financial instrument or as an official confirmation of any transaction. All market prices, data and other information are not warranted as to completeness or accuracy and are subject to change without notice. Any comments or statements made herein do not necessarily reflect those of JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates. This transmission may contain information that is privileged, confidential, legally privileged, and/or exempt from disclosure under applicable law. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the information contained herein (including any reliance thereon) is STRICTLY PROHIBITED. Although this transmission and any attachments are believed to be free of any virus or other defect that might affect any computer system into which it is received and opened, it is the responsibility of the recipient to ensure that it is virus free and no responsibility is accepted by JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates, as applicable, for any loss or damage arising in any way from its use. If you received this transmission in error, please immediately contact the sender and destroy the material in its entirety, whether in electronic or hard copy format. Thank you. Please refer to http://www.jpmorgan.com/pages/disclosures for disclosures
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
I think your reading more into my comments that I put there. I pointed one specific case of DNS, it was not a generality or implied that you or anyone doesn't not know what they are doing. I that case they clearly did not. We had to hire a contractor to help because the GUI was not available for them to work, these where MSCE trained people, who should know. And please no Microsoft bashes about that from anyone. My point is for an OS a GUI DOES Hide what is happening behind the buttons, that is a GUI's Point. To make like easier. But as an OS person we should know what that button Does as you stated. My Original Comment on this whole thing was the a 3270 Emulator really is not a GUI. It is a text based implementation on a GUI desktop, that does not make it a GUI, your still typing commands. So If I said In general all those who use gui's and do not have the correct background and who do not read about their product and take time to explore, to look at logs to see the effect and so on is that specific enough? We live in a world where we generalize, it's up to the people to decide if that applies to them personally or not. If your or anyone was offended I'm sorry you mistook my words that way. William 'Doug' Carroll -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Schuh, Richard Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 4:15 PM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? And then you have someone like me who finds typing to be burdensome due to a physical condition. If I had a GUI to manage the operating system, I would welcome it. One point I was making is that saying or implying that because someone prefers a GUI, they do not know what they are doing is a generality that has exceptions and is offensive. One can know how to do something using primitives and simply choose an easier method. It happens all of the time. It is why we have tools like Rexx and CMS Pipelines, for instance. I am familiar with machine instructions, but I do not write programs using them. The closest I have ever come to it (post IBM 601 days) is using Assembler. Does that make me stupid or a bad person? Does that imply that I don't know what I am doing? I think not. As for your example of the DNS admins, they should know their limits as well as their abilities. Rule number 1 applies - if you do not know what a command does, do not enter it; if you do not know what clicking on an icon does, do not click it. If you do not know how to do something, read the manual or help files or ask someone who does know. If you go beyond your limits, be prepared to pay the price. The same can be said of every user from end user to admin (including DNS admin); from system operator to systems programmer. I would rather have someone ask very basic questions than do something they shouldn't, something that causes harm to themselves or others, for lack of asking. Regards, Richard Schuh -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of William D Carroll Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 10:32 AM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? I think we can safely assume that since this discussion was about VM CMS that we're talking operating systems and interfaces to those OS's not applications as is your wife's case GUI's have their place, I personally do not believe that place is in an OS to manage it or it's subsystems where understanding what happens is very important. I know DNS admins who can't manage their servers without GUI's. That to me is ridiculous and are admins who need to understand more about what they manage. Are they more productive maybe, are they dangerous, I leave that to you Think of this, what happens to those admins if their gui breaks and all they have is command line. William 'Doug' Carroll -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Schuh, Richard Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 12:54 PM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? That is an assumption or opinion, not necessarily a fact. For example, my wife may not know the operating system line mode commands, but she certainly knows the accounting systems that she uses via a GUI interface. In fact, the GUI represents an increase in productivity. I would suggest that if you do not know what you are doing, then you should not use either interface; if you do know, you should use whatever interface you choose. Rule Number 1 (Know what you are doing) applies. Regards, Richard Schuh You still type in your 3270 emulator, you still have to know what you're doing. GUI's hide that from you Doug This communication
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
On 11/24/2010 at 04:50 PM, William D Carroll william.d.carr...@jpmchase.com wrote: My Original Comment on this whole thing was the a 3270 Emulator really is not a GUI. It is a text based implementation on a GUI desktop, that does not make it a GUI, your still typing commands. Of course it is, when you use it to execute commands such as rdrlist, filelist, xedit, cut and paste, and any number of other tasks. Having a GUI doesn't mean you don't type or don't think, it just means you type less, and perhaps different things. My point is, people are conflating using GUIs with incompetence, and the two are orthogonal. They bash other people that use their favorite GUI, but would never be willing to give up their own. My company provides a tool called YaST. It can run as a GUI, or an ncurses application. Or, the sysadmin can do everything from the command line. YaST _can_ make Linux sysadmins' lives easier, but if used exclusively, will actually make them less productive. (Think of adding a couple hundred user accounts to multiple systems. Point and click? No way.) Alternatively, exclusively _not_ using a GUI can also make you less productive. GUIs are good for reducing the amount of time and skill needed for repetitive tasks. (They're also good for automating well-defined tasks that involve a lot of moving parts that a human can overlook.) They're not a replacement for a sysadmin's need to understand their OS, and how to accomplish things outside of it. Blasting people who use GUIs for being incompetent instead of blasting incompetent (or sorely undertrained) people who just happen to be using a GUI misses the root cause. Mark Post
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
You are totally missing my point Maybe your definition of a GUI is different than what I know to be a GUI. William 'Doug' Carroll -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Mark Post Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2010 6:33 PM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? On 11/24/2010 at 04:50 PM, William D Carroll william.d.carr...@jpmchase.com wrote: My Original Comment on this whole thing was the a 3270 Emulator really is not a GUI. It is a text based implementation on a GUI desktop, that does not make it a GUI, your still typing commands. Of course it is, when you use it to execute commands such as rdrlist, filelist, xedit, cut and paste, and any number of other tasks. Having a GUI doesn't mean you don't type or don't think, it just means you type less, and perhaps different things. My point is, people are conflating using GUIs with incompetence, and the two are orthogonal. They bash other people that use their favorite GUI, but would never be willing to give up their own. My company provides a tool called YaST. It can run as a GUI, or an ncurses application. Or, the sysadmin can do everything from the command line. YaST _can_ make Linux sysadmins' lives easier, but if used exclusively, will actually make them less productive. (Think of adding a couple hundred user accounts to multiple systems. Point and click? No way.) Alternatively, exclusively _not_ using a GUI can also make you less productive. GUIs are good for reducing the amount of time and skill needed for repetitive tasks. (They're also good for automating well-defined tasks that involve a lot of moving parts that a human can overlook.) They're not a replacement for a sysadmin's need to understand their OS, and how to accomplish things outside of it. Blasting people who use GUIs for being incompetent instead of blasting incompetent (or sorely undertrained) people who just happen to be using a GUI misses the root cause. Mark Post This communication is for informational purposes only. It is not intended as an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any financial instrument or as an official confirmation of any transaction. All market prices, data and other information are not warranted as to completeness or accuracy and are subject to change without notice. Any comments or statements made herein do not necessarily reflect those of JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates. This transmission may contain information that is privileged, confidential, legally privileged, and/or exempt from disclosure under applicable law. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the information contained herein (including any reliance thereon) is STRICTLY PROHIBITED. Although this transmission and any attachments are believed to be free of any virus or other defect that might affect any computer system into which it is received and opened, it is the responsibility of the recipient to ensure that it is virus free and no responsibility is accepted by JPMorgan Chase Co., its subsidiaries and affiliates, as applicable, for any loss or damage arising in any way from its use. If you received this transmission in error, please immediately contact the sender and destroy the material in its entirety, whether in electronic or hard copy format. Thank you. Please refer to http://www.jpmorgan.com/pages/disclosures for disclosures relating to European legal entities.
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
Perceptive choice of words, prepared to admit. The GUI is another terrific bit of work by the Endicott team that we turned our noses up at. It uses the same agent as ... shoot ... ISPF, I think. So the last time I ran it (on 5.4, within the past year) I had to steal an agent from one of the MVS guys. But, yeah, it worked. The agent requires that something be installed on your workstation, therefore getting users ramped up is a little clunky. These days, they just want a browser, but they forget the requirements which all browsers impose. Then again, the browsers address a serious deployment requirement. Nicely integrated with CMS MT, the CMS GUI happily runs in the background while you get your CMS Ready; prompt back. And XEDIT on a GUI is cool, if a bit strange. HUGE GAPING HOLES in what is present -vs- what is needed. I blame us, the customers. We have whined about some really slick innovation that came out of the VM lab. We should have embraced it, found uses the designers could not envision, and demanded improvements. For my part, I whined loudly about OpenVM (a related feature) when it first hit (about the same time). Nick Gimbrone rightly chastised me for engaging my mouth before my brain was in gear. Later, I recognized the value of OVM and have been singing its praises for more almost 15 years now. The GUI is probably not nearly as useful. My point is that they are both undervalued assets in CMS. If your young apprentices are wanting a better interface, maybe they'll be pleased to drive some work through a web server. I can recommend one. :-) Q: what exactly do we have in VM/CMS? A: the most robust virtual machine hypervisor in existence coupled with the most efficient application development environment available. The number of ways to interface with either is more than I can count. Surely your junior sysprogs can employ their imagination and come up with something to their liking. -- R; Rick Troth Velocity Software http://www.velocitysoftware.com/ On Tue, Nov 23, 2010 at 07:54, Jeff Gribbin jeff.grib...@gmail.com wrote: Greetings folks, Some recent discussion brought to mind the old CMS GUI Facility that shipped with VM/ESA 2.1 - and now I'm in a position where I might for the first time actually be able to configure a z/VM system to allow me to play with the beast, I got to wondering if it even still exists. The best I've been able to find in the way of IBM documentation is: http://www.vm.ibm.com/gui/ I found an interesting reference to a 2004 z/VM GUI project - http://web2.clarkson.edu/projects/cosi/zTeam/zvmgui/ but alas that seems to have since sunk without trace. So ... a few questions ... Anybody using it? Anybody prepared to admit they're using it? Anybody know if it's still maintained in any current form? This is purely a personal learning exercise triggered by the aforementioned conversation and my recent exposure to young sysprogs ( 25 years old) who tend to love what CP and CMS can do but fall about laughing whenever the user interface is discussed. All comments gratefully received. Regards Jeff
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
Hi, Jeff. Yes, the VM GUI facility still exists. On 11/23/2010 06:54 AM, Jeff Gribbin wrote: Greetings folks, Some recent discussion brought to mind the old CMS GUI Facility that shipped with VM/ESA 2.1 - and now I'm in a position where I might for the first time actually be able to configure a z/VM system to allow me to play with the beast, I got to wondering if it even still exists. [snip.] So ... a few questions ... Anybody using it? Yes, several folks are still using it (I'm one of them, btw). The most active user that I know of is Kris Buelens in Belgium ((kris.buel...@gmail.com). He's written a number of very nice (imho) GUI interfaces for monitoring and managing collections of z/VM systems that he has made availabel off of the IBM VM Web download page. They might be a good place to start showing your young sysprogs that VM can support such a point and click interface. Anybody prepared to admit they're using it? Yes, I will admit to that.:-) Anybody know if it's still maintained in any current form? Nope, it's not being supported by IBM any moreuse it at your own risk, ymmv, may cause drowsiness if taken with alcohol, do not operate heavy machinery for 3 hours after taking (how much does a z10 weigh, anyway?), etc. etc. This is purely a personal learning exercise triggered by the aforementioned conversation and my recent exposure to young sysprogs ( 25 years old) who tend to love what CP and CMS can do but fall about laughing whenever the user interface is discussed. All comments gratefully received. General thoughts 1) to get the most out of the GUI and applications built on top of it, it really needs to be run on OS/2 platform (or OS/2's follow on system, eComStation). I keep an old Dell laptop system here, running eCS, just so I can run GUI apps there. 2) the client side agent (the so-called workstation agent WSA) is the same agent as is used by ISPF to support it's off-loading of editing functions to a PC. I *think* that may still be under IBM support, but I'm not sure. 3) at one point in time the WSA ran on Windows (Windows 95? Windows NT?), but I don't know if it would run on a more modern Windows system. 4) If you are considering writing your own GUI applications, get Kris's GUIWIRE code from the IBM VM download page; it's a major help in developing the program logic flow (the wiring). Hope this helps, and Happy Thanksgiving, too. Regards Jeff -- Dave Jones V/Soft Software www.vsoft-software.com Houston, TX 281.578.7544
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
Please tell ur laughing friends that GUI, *point and click*, is for people who can't type. In the mainframe world and particularly z/VM you not only need to know how to *type* but also *think* the old shibboleth of IBM, which made it great, and which George Bernard Shaw claimed occurs among us only once or twice a year, though he claimed he could think once a week. GUI is *smoke and mirrors*, dream stuff. OTOH, Mainframe, *Green Screen*, or whatever is a real operating system which does the thinking, really processing, since computers can't think, behind the GUI curtain. Jeff Gribbin jeff.grib...@gmail.com Sent by: The IBM z/VM Operating System IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU 11/23/2010 07:54 AM Please respond to The IBM z/VM Operating System IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU To IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU cc Subject The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? Greetings folks, Some recent discussion brought to mind the old CMS GUI Facility that ship ped with VM/ESA 2.1 - and now I'm in a position where I might for the first t ime actually be able to configure a z/VM system to allow me to play with the beast, I got to wondering if it even still exists. The best I've been able to find in the way of IBM documentation is: http://www.vm.ibm.com/gui/ I found an interesting reference to a 2004 z/VM GUI project - http://web2.clarkson.edu/projects/cosi/zTeam/zvmgui/ but alas that seems to have since sunk without trace. So ... a few questions ... Anybody using it? Anybody prepared to admit they're using it? Anybody know if it's still maintained in any current form? This is purely a personal learning exercise triggered by the aforemention ed conversation and my recent exposure to young sysprogs ( 25 years old) wh o tend to love what CP and CMS can do but fall about laughing whenever the user interface is discussed. All comments gratefully received. Regards Jeff
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
The VM/CMS GUI was interesting in it's day as an end user tool. Today, user interface technology is far beyond what it could ever have dreamed of. Also, the interaction available with the system (z/VM) has grown up many fold. Systems Programmers can choose to use a GUI or the green screen, which ever suits them. Of course, using the GUI hides (read:protects) the Systems Programmer from potential pitfalls of their craft. Advanced sysprogs may or may not appreciate this, but novices will certainly benefit from such advances in these user interfaces. On 11/23/2010 09:19 AM, George Henke/NYLIC wrote: Please tell ur laughing friends that GUI, *point and click*, is for people who can't type. In the mainframe world and particularly z/VM you not only need to know how to *type* but also *think* the old shibboleth of IBM, which made it great, and which George Bernard Shaw claimed occurs among us only once or twice a year, though he claimed he could think once a week. GUI is *smoke and mirrors*, dream stuff. OTOH, Mainframe, *Green Screen*, or whatever is a real operating system which does the thinking, really processing, since computers can't think, behind the GUI curtain. -- Rich Smrcina Velocity Software, Inc. Mobile: 414-491-6001 Office: 262-392-3717 http://www.velocitysoftware.com Catch the WAVV! http://www.wavv.org WAVV 2011 - April 15-19, 2011 Colorado Springs, CO
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
Anybody using it? Sort of. Anybody prepared to admit they're using it? Kris Bulens is the master dude of CMS GUI stuff. Dave Jones and I did some stuff with it a few years back and there are some cool example bits on the VM Download Library, but the clients have all but disappeared, the Mac one no longer runs, the Windows one no longer runs post-XP, and there never was a Linux one, AFAIK. I doubt the Solaris and AIX ones still work as well. Anybody know if it's still maintained in any current form? It's still there and still works, but the clients haven't been touched in ages and aren't maintained at all AFAICT. They use the same line protocol as the z/OS ISPF GUI, but that isn't maintained much either. I believe Sir Alan indicated a while back that it is no longer considered strategic, so don't expect upgrades, etc. I wouldn't build anything new based on it.
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
Ok, Sorry George, I (who can type) find that offensive. The biggest challenge the z/vm platform has to grow is lack of people that understand 3270, or are even interested. Or do y'all want the platform to die as us people that can type get old, retire? vmware is winning the battle world wide with their gui and now are the base line for virtualization. So we either conform to how the world has changed, or be the dinasour they think we are. If you look at http://vm2.velocitysoftware.com/zpro;, this is our demo system of what we're going to ship as ZPRO. ZPRO started as a simple cloning tool, but now has turned into a project to address z/VM's real needs, hoping to attract the minds and hearts of future generations. George Henke/NYLIC wrote: Please tell ur laughing friends that GUI, *point and click*, is for people who can't type. In the mainframe world and particularly z/VM you not only need to know how to *type* but also *think* the old shibboleth of IBM, which made it great, and which George Bernard Shaw claimed occurs among us only once or twice a year, though he claimed he could think once a week. GUI is *smoke and mirrors*, dream stuff. OTOH, Mainframe, *Green Screen*, or whatever is a real operating system which does the thinking, really processing, since computers can't think, behind the GUI curtain. *Jeff Gribbin jeff.grib...@gmail.com* Sent by: The IBM z/VM Operating System IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU 11/23/2010 07:54 AM Please respond to The IBM z/VM Operating System IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU To IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU cc Subject The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? Greetings folks, Some recent discussion brought to mind the old CMS GUI Facility that ship ped with VM/ESA 2.1 - and now I'm in a position where I might for the first t ime actually be able to configure a z/VM system to allow me to play with the beast, I got to wondering if it even still exists. The best I've been able to find in the way of IBM documentation is: http://www.vm.ibm.com/gui/ I found an interesting reference to a 2004 z/VM GUI project - http://web2.clarkson.edu/projects/cosi/zTeam/zvmgui/ but alas that seems to have since sunk without trace. So ... a few questions ... Anybody using it? Anybody prepared to admit they're using it? Anybody know if it's still maintained in any current form? This is purely a personal learning exercise triggered by the aforemention ed conversation and my recent exposure to young sysprogs ( 25 years old) wh o tend to love what CP and CMS can do but fall about laughing whenever the user interface is discussed. All comments gratefully received. Regards Jeff
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
Regards, Richard Schuh Advanced sysprogs may or may not appreciate this, but novices will certainly benefit from such advances in these user interfaces. As can those who are keyboard challenged, regardless of their experience level.
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
On 11/23/2010 at 10:19 AM, George Henke/NYLIC george_he...@newyorklife.com wrote: Please tell ur laughing friends that GUI, *point and click*, is for people who can't type. If you really believe that, then I would like to hear your reaction after giving up your 3270 emulator and doing all your work from a 2714. Mark Post
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
He said he liked typing, not killing trees... -- Bob Nix On 11/23/10 1:30 PM, Mark Post mp...@novell.com wrote: On 11/23/2010 at 10:19 AM, George Henke/NYLIC george_he...@newyorklife.com wrote: Please tell ur laughing friends that GUI, *point and click*, is for people who can't type. If you really believe that, then I would like to hear your reaction after giving up your 3270 emulator and doing all your work from a 2714. Mark Post
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
Ah, the halycion days of the 2714 and 2260, before all this jazz, I remember it well. Earlier this year I had an opportunity to return to those callow years by working again as an COBOL application programmer for a client who had installed FEPI on a massive CICS/DB2 application. They did this so they could *dumb down* the end user job description and hire less expensive customer service staff who only needed to *point and click*, not *type* or even think for that matter. The FEPI application they used was a vendor package that did little more than screen scraping to produce the desired GUI effect. For some strange reason, management simply could not understand why their CPU time had grown astronomically while their transaction volumes had decreased significantly. They were outsourced to IBM and therefore very CPU cost conscious. The increase in CPU time coincided precisely with the cutover from *green screen* to FEPI. The problem was that the FEPI program created transaction paths through scores of CICS *green screens*, so that when the end user clicked a few icons to process just 1 transaction, it triggered dozens of CICS *green screens*, ie CICS transactions. This was very obvious in emulator mode. When you clicked just a few icons to enter a transaction you could see dozens for CICS screens fly by under the covers. So any savings in hiring less expensive customer service staff was more than absorbed by the enormous increase in CPU time charges from IBM. But that was nothing compared with the editing problems introduced by all this into the COBOL application programs. It seems when the vendor installed the *screen scraping* they failed to incorporate the BMS map field editing rules in their window filtering and under FEPI,, BMS is turned off. So the end result was numerous 0C7's because the underlying COBOL application code was expecting BMS to check numeric fields for IF NUMERIC, but BMS was not longer in the picture, no pun intended ;-). So we all spent much of our time adding editing logic into the application programs which had formerly been performed very efficiently by BMS and which now had to be done in the code because the FEPI screen scraper had preempted BMS and failed to incorporate the filtering. It was a very labor-intensive, time-consuming, inefficient process and use of time by both man and machine with a long change control process to go through to implement each fix. All because the end user did not feel like typing or thinking. There is a price to be paid for such a luxury. And . . . All that glitters is not gold as this case proved. This company had previously tried to convert their legacy COBOL CICS/DB2 application to client server and failed and had finally resigned themselves and formalized it into company strategic policy, to stay with mainframe COBOL architecture. OOP, UNIX, SQL Server, etc, etc, simply could not do the processing the old structured COBOL CICS/DB2 did. OOP has been likened to going through airport security. FEPI was just an attempt to put lipstick on the pig because they could not convert the *pig*. One insurance company I know had some nice new GUI applications, but still had *green screen* for their old main insurance application. I asked them why they had not *put lipstick on this pig*? They said they had thought of doing so, but had done rigorous time and motion studies and had just found that 3270 *green screen* was ergnomically more efficient, at least for this application, if not in general. The idea in the FEPI situation was to *dumb down* the customer service job so the end user did not have to type or even do much thinking. Ergo, GUI is for people who can't type and to some extent either can't or ,at least, don't think. But please do not be offended, because that is not necessarily a bad thing. As other listers have well pointed out, it does open the door for many others who might otherwise not have had a job and it provides a seamless path to higher skills for those who are conscientious enough to take advantage of the opportunity. Nothing is either good or bad but thinking makes it so Shakespeare RPN01 nix.rob...@mayo.edu Sent by: The IBM z/VM Operating System IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU 11/23/2010 02:33 PM Please respond to The IBM z/VM Operating System IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU To IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU cc Subject Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? He said he liked typing, not killing trees... -- Bob Nix On 11/23/10 1:30 PM, Mark Post mp...@novell.com wrote: On 11/23/2010 at 10:19 AM, George Henke/NYLIC george_he...@newyorklife.com wrote: Please tell ur laughing friends that GUI, *point and click*, is for people who can't type. If you really believe that, then I would like to hear your reaction after giving up your 3270 emulator and doing all your work from a 2714. Mark Post
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
Hello! Sadly Jeff, I am prepared to admit to nothing. However seeing the webpage brought about an interesting thing. About the time it surfaced I participated in a round of discussions concerning IBM's attempts to write software for both sides via a GUI. I believe it was called Value Age, or something of a sort, its way before Eclipse. Anyway the page more or less confirmed it when it showed that the only downloads for it were for OS/2 and Windows 95, which certainly agreed with the resulting discussions. Incidentally I did see a series of other related downloads, some of them were in fact tagged as coming from this august gathering. Just for fun I am tempted to assemble a virtual machine containing either OS/2 or Win95 and see what does happen and why. --- Gregg C Levine hansolofal...@att.net This signature is not the same one. Move along! Move along! -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Jeff Gribbin Sent: Tuesday, November 23, 2010 7:54 AM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: [IBMVM] The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? Greetings folks, Some recent discussion brought to mind the old CMS GUI Facility that shipped with VM/ESA 2.1 - and now I'm in a position where I might for the first time actually be able to configure a z/VM system to allow me to play with the beast, I got to wondering if it even still exists. The best I've been able to find in the way of IBM documentation is: http://www.vm.ibm.com/gui/ I found an interesting reference to a 2004 z/VM GUI project - http://web2.clarkson.edu/projects/cosi/zTeam/zvmgui/ but alas that seems to have since sunk without trace. So ... a few questions ... Anybody using it? Anybody prepared to admit they're using it? Anybody know if it's still maintained in any current form? This is purely a personal learning exercise triggered by the aforementioned conversation and my recent exposure to young sysprogs ( 25 years old) who tend to love what CP and CMS can do but fall about laughing whenever the user interface is discussed. All comments gratefully received. Regards Jeff
Re: The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live?
The WSA still runs fine on Windows/XP. It has more errors than the WSA under OS/2, but is is usable well. What I couldn't get to work here on Windows/XP is the WSA GUI builder, that runs only on OS/2. Creating C/SGUI apps without the builder can be done, with a lot calls to the various DT commands in REXX for example. But, Guy De Ceulaer and I created also a subroutine to make it easier to create panels without the builder. My CPQUERY too uses that. GUIWIRE supposes you create the panels with the builder, and only in these conditions can it help you a lot. There is a redbook about it, but GUIWIRE was created later, so it is not described in it. Other of my subroutines are, and an enhanced version of it is it in my GUISKEL package. But, GUIWIRE is much better than GUISKEL. 2010/11/23 Gregg C Levine hansolofal...@att.net Hello! Sadly Jeff, I am prepared to admit to nothing. However seeing the webpage brought about an interesting thing. About the time it surfaced I participated in a round of discussions concerning IBM's attempts to write software for both sides via a GUI. I believe it was called Value Age, or something of a sort, its way before Eclipse. Anyway the page more or less confirmed it when it showed that the only downloads for it were for OS/2 and Windows 95, which certainly agreed with the resulting discussions. Incidentally I did see a series of other related downloads, some of them were in fact tagged as coming from this august gathering.b Just for fun I am tempted to assemble a virtual machine containing either OS/2 or Win95 and see what does happen and why. --- Gregg C Levine hansolofal...@att.net This signature is not the same one. Move along! Move along! -Original Message- From: The IBM z/VM Operating System [mailto:ib...@listserv.uark.edu] On Behalf Of Jeff Gribbin Sent: Tuesday, November 23, 2010 7:54 AM To: IBMVM@LISTSERV.UARK.EDU Subject: [IBMVM] The old VM/ESA CMS GUI - Does it still live? Greetings folks, Some recent discussion brought to mind the old CMS GUI Facility that shipped with VM/ESA 2.1 - and now I'm in a position where I might for the first time actually be able to configure a z/VM system to allow me to play with the beast, I got to wondering if it even still exists. The best I've been able to find in the way of IBM documentation is: http://www.vm.ibm.com/gui/ I found an interesting reference to a 2004 z/VM GUI project - http://web2.clarkson.edu/projects/cosi/zTeam/zvmgui/ but alas that seems to have since sunk without trace. So ... a few questions ... Anybody using it? Anybody prepared to admit they're using it? Anybody know if it's still maintained in any current form? This is purely a personal learning exercise triggered by the aforementioned conversation and my recent exposure to young sysprogs ( 25 years old) who tend to love what CP and CMS can do but fall about laughing whenever the user interface is discussed. All comments gratefully received. Regards Jeff -- Kris Buelens, IBM Belgium, VM customer support
