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  • Re: IBM ancient history, Protocol constraints shaping communities

    From John Levine@3:633/10 to All on Friday, March 27, 2026 18:43:24
    According to Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid>:
    On 2026-03-27, Lawrence D?Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

    On Thu, 26 Mar 2026 21:23:55 -0700, Lars Poulsen wrote:

    //FORT.SYSIN DD *
    source
    /*

    I think I can make sense of this pattern: the first name after ?//? is
    the dataset name; ?DD? indicates a dataset is being defined, and ?*?
    the sentinel to indicate that the end of the data will consist of ?/?
    followed by this string.

    Presumably, FORT.SYSIN is the dataset name expected by the Fortran
    compiler for the input source file.

    //LINK.SYSIN DD *
    overlay description
    /*

    Similarly, LINK.SYSIN is the dataset name expected by the Linker.

    Actually LKED.SYSIN but pretty close.


    As for this line:

    //MYJOB EXEC FORTGCLG

    my guess is, FORTGCLG is the name of a JCL macro that does a compile,
    link and run of a user program. MYJOB is presumably some arbitrary job
    name, and EXEC is the command to run the macro as the job.

    Not necessarily a macro; more often it was the name of an executable
    program.

    It's a macro which they called a cataloged procedure and yes FORTGCLG
    was Fortran G, compile, link edit, and go. If it was directly running
    a program it'd say so:

    //MYJOB EXEC PGM=someprogram

    Nearly everyone used cataloged procecures since that made your job deck
    a lot smaller.

    --
    Regards,
    John Levine, johnl@taugh.com, Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
    Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. https://jl.ly

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.13
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Peter Flass@3:633/10 to All on Friday, March 27, 2026 12:52:28
    On 3/27/26 11:43, John Levine wrote:
    According to Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid>:
    On 2026-03-27, Lawrence D?Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

    On Thu, 26 Mar 2026 21:23:55 -0700, Lars Poulsen wrote:

    //FORT.SYSIN DD *
    source
    /*

    I think I can make sense of this pattern: the first name after ?//? is
    the dataset name; ?DD? indicates a dataset is being defined, and ?*?
    the sentinel to indicate that the end of the data will consist of ?/?
    followed by this string.

    Presumably, FORT.SYSIN is the dataset name expected by the Fortran
    compiler for the input source file.

    //LINK.SYSIN DD *
    overlay description
    /*

    Similarly, LINK.SYSIN is the dataset name expected by the Linker.

    Actually LKED.SYSIN but pretty close.

    LINK is probably right. It's <stepname>.<ddname>, so it depends on what
    the step in the PROC is named.

    You do know that this isn't ancient history, don't you? Well, Fortran G
    is pretty well gone, but zOS systems still run on JCL today.


    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.13
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From John Levine@3:633/10 to All on Friday, March 27, 2026 20:25:49
    It appears that Peter Flass <Peter@Iron-Spring.com> said:
    On 3/27/26 11:43, John Levine wrote:
    According to Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid>:
    On 2026-03-27, Lawrence D?Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

    On Thu, 26 Mar 2026 21:23:55 -0700, Lars Poulsen wrote:

    //FORT.SYSIN DD *
    source
    /*

    I think I can make sense of this pattern: the first name after ?//? is >>>> the dataset name; ?DD? indicates a dataset is being defined, and ?*?
    the sentinel to indicate that the end of the data will consist of ?/?
    followed by this string.

    Presumably, FORT.SYSIN is the dataset name expected by the Fortran
    compiler for the input source file.

    //LINK.SYSIN DD *
    overlay description
    /*

    Similarly, LINK.SYSIN is the dataset name expected by the Linker.

    Actually LKED.SYSIN but pretty close.

    LINK is probably right. It's <stepname>.<ddname>, so it depends on what
    the step in the PROC is named.

    It's LKED.SYSIN. C28-6639-1 says so.

    You do know that this isn't ancient history, don't you? Well, Fortran G
    is pretty well gone, but zOS systems still run on JCL today.

    True, but I'm trying not to think about it. I wonder how much of the stuff that zOS
    does these days is jobs with JCL versus online stuff. I suppose the online subsystems
    are started from JCL jobs.
    --
    Regards,
    John Levine, johnl@taugh.com, Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
    Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. https://jl.ly

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.13
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)
  • From Lawrence D?Oliveiro@3:633/10 to All on Friday, March 27, 2026 20:55:20
    On Fri, 27 Mar 2026 12:52:28 -0700, Peter Flass wrote:

    You do know that this isn't ancient history, don't you? Well,
    Fortran G is pretty well gone, but zOS systems still run on JCL
    today.

    Vestigial legacy technology. As each business still with an IBM
    mainframe at its core goes bankrupt or otherwise gets acquired and
    shut down, so the mainframe market shrinks by another little bit.

    --- PyGate Linux v1.5.13
    * Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)