Not all change is progress. I like to be an early adopter, but if the latest thing on the block is garbage then call me a dynosaur - I won't use it voluntarily. If an old language or old tool suits my needs, I won't drop it just because it's out of fashion. ISPF have flaws, but they also have strengths; I will continue to use them when it makes sense to do so. Amusingly enough, some of the "modern" software that I'm supposed to put up with is itself pretty long in the tooth.
Note; I don't like Perl syntax, but I use it anyway - because it offers me enough that I'm willing to put up with it. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz http://mason.gmu.edu/~smetz3 ________________________________________ From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU] on behalf of David Crayford [dcrayf...@gmail.com] Sent: Sunday, March 29, 2020 10:08 PM To: IBM-MAIN@LISTSERV.UA.EDU Subject: Re: strange python announcement On 2020-03-30 2:43 AM, Charles Mills wrote: >> There's no advantage to REXX anymore, as fine a language as it is. > is not entirely true, right? Three advantages of Rexx would be native support > of EBCDIC, native support of xSAM, and straightforward invocation from TSO? > Right? > > Again, not trying to pick a fight, just trying to understand. > > Here's my motivation: I am trying to avoid dinosaurization. I am trying to > answer the questions "am I being an old fuddy-duddy for sticking with Rexx > over Python? Should I make an effort to embrace Python for the tasks where I > now tend to turn to Rexx?" Take the dinosaur test. Do you use Git? > > And it sounds like the answer is No. Whatever dinosaurism I exhibit is in > sticking with TSO and ISPF, not in sticking with Rexx. (For what it's worth, > when I speak with customer personnel, 100% of them, to a man or woman, seems > to assume the computer world revolves around TSO for sysprogs and batch for > production -- so it makes sense for me to be most conversant with those > environments.) Is that a stereotype? I see a lot of young people working on mainframes (boths sysprogs and applications guys) who use modern tooling. The editor of choice is vscode with plugins https://secure-web.cisco.com/1eIMQVsY7papmDtxqCBNMtk8g2ijtX3gdC-KYp-U82BZB_h_XlDZr0OaMObgz7nd8eXAc-jU8QAEt7woLv9kmVJDrSSIdqzDkCWmphIKeQlM_Ps9C3kTjHGVqlHyN1nRHilDZkF0vOf6lhMBgJjMtxofAu5JLIFLg-LtgkKSJrV2tbphEqczI0V7DjOhJl9Yktdsu127NS0ya86Ov4_v514dAIc8m40U7UHmbzQC3qcJfvPjP_1UgWuyuCgpNdnIaYrFL4-wD3BLCFp5gB7nTJ4xroq46UF88qrnKX268AWvKt_Y6DJ3oH2YbA7nDF8aO4s3hgJ4vPRwp9-I9lj73IVkvMD8HAWDWmh6NR7z40htLyMbTNcps78RxBjzs-QRw-OYb24MS1znrVMOx6MtPgP_A4paM-tyyf_Yw9dUNvAAibKMUQgFpErMz916saybS6pB7JqkgzrhbPeeSoAz6Qw/https%3A%2F%2Fibm.github.io%2Fzopeneditor-about%2F. You can deploy editor instances on the cloud using Eclipse Che with a web based UI. The mainframe has to keep up with the pace of modernization or it will slowly wither on the vine as no young person will want to work on it. The editor is just an example. Languages and tools are just as important as the IDE. > > It also sounds like learning Python would not be a bad thing, but that it > would probably make more sense to become familiar first on an interactive > ASCII platform, and then perhaps bring the skills I learn there to Z -- > rather than starting out by trying to solve Z problems in an unfamiliar > environment with an unfamiliar language. Would others agree? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 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
