First job out of university was in RPG 2, which I had never heard of before my interview. Learned on the job.
Still programming in RPG, but it "isn't your daddy's RPG"
There are still lots of companies that use it in IBM midrange shops. One company I was at until 2007 had their computer crash only once since 1992 - the reason was that the UPS batteries were dead and they shut down power for a company renovation. The IBM i (once called the AS/400) has been a reliable workhorse since its inception. Many companies that have it won't give it up because of that.
I can communicate with any other system and do it with a smaller programming staff than most shops. I have mostly been an employee, as I am now, but spent almost 7 years as a consultant around Columbus Ohio also.
When I was in university over 30 years ago I had a large collection of "Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers", "Zippy the Pinhead", and "Fat Freddy's Cat" comics.
I cannot remember which one it was, but one part of one comic had a way to change lights that was quite interesting. If more than one car is coming to an intersection and the light was red, you could put in money to make it change. The person who put in the most got it to change. Many times it would only take a penny, but if many rich people were in a hurry it could start a bidding war. I always think of this when I come to stupidly controlled red lights where I am the only car.
On another note, I was just in Norway and Denmark for 2 weeks. I rented a car and in most areas I was at there were no lights or stop signs. Almost all traffic was controlled by roundabouts where needed and places where there would have been a stop sign in the US, there was a yield sign in Norway. I liked it.
I had a house where I had to take off a metal return vent cover in order to put a temporary cupboard base in. I put a mouse trap near it and a mouse got caught by just one arm and fell into the long metal return duct. It kept flipping around in there making an awful racket! I had to take the end cap off the duct and reach in about 15 feet with kids toys hooked together (I had to put them together in pieces since the end cap was near a wall) to pull out this mouse & trap. It took quite a while and the entire time it was like someone banging on the duct work all through the house.
I program in RPG on an iSeries (see my sign on name).
We have the opposite problem. I think 40 is the youngest programmer on our staff of about 10 people who are programming. I have jokingly told lots of people that my skills are so out of date that they are back in demand. I think it is similar with COBOL programmers. My skills aren't really out of date, they just aren't the "sexy" jobs in languages most people think of. I like my job and the people I work with and we get a lot of work done that drives a thriving business.
Not that we take any old "old" person. We just had a 60 year old on a 60 day "try and buy" and he couldn't stay awake - blamed it on medication. He did a lousy job also so didn't even last the full 60 days. We find it hard to find anyone qualified and the ones we do try aren't young. None the less, it is a great platform.
Like I tell my friends, my skills are so outdated they are in demand. Not really true since the language has changed a lot. It is not a sexy language, and most of the people I work with are 40 or older, but the IBM i (AS/400, iSeries, etc.) still hums along great for a small investment. Companies that have them love them.
I worked at a place used a vendors software that also had a server based version. They wanted us to switch but the owner said "Our current servers crash often, but our iSeries has been up since 1993 and has not gone down except when the power was cut and we found out our UPS batteries were dead." At the time, that was 13 years of steady processing.
A user calls and says they have a problem with program x so they call me. When they get there, they cannot reproduce the bug. We assume that the software know that it is whipped once I come into the picture so it fixes itself. You would not believe how many times this has happened over 30+ years.
I am over 50 and with with another programmer who is over 50. I had thought about it if it got cheap, but then my "neighbor" told me he regrets doing it. He still uses 2 pairs of glasses. He uses readers you can buy anywhere while sitting at his desk and a half reader (nothing on top, reader on bottom) type of bifocal for all other times. He spent a few thousand to have it done and they didn't tell him it doesn't correct for the most common part of getting older, namely being able to see close things.
I completely disagree with you. I have used MSE on ALL my familys machines since it came out and I have yet to have it fail and yet to notice ANY slowing of my system other anti-virus programs caused. Any it is approved by my work VPN AV check. I am completely satisfied with it.
I can only hope the "liberal-minded activists" are moving from Ohio. We can use less of them here. I am always embarassed for people with Obama bumper stickers still on their car.
I saw this in the news yesterday and contacted a friend who worked there for a while. He said the company is a billionaire's toy shop and nothing has ever come to final production. He thought this project was shelved and told me to not hold my breath.
I have found that Feit Electric makes the worst CFL bulbs there are. We are lucky if they last a year - not the 5-7 years they advertise. I still buy them because our local electric companies in Ohio subsidize them and they are quite often under 50 cents apiece.
She is amazed how many people are "full code" (meaning the staff must do anything to save them), even when they are very old and frail. It is usually the family that wants this. They don't realize what this will mean in reality. It means that if their heart stops they must do chest compressions which will probably break the persons ribs when they are old and fragile.
I played in 1977 at North Branch HS. We had a computer programming class with the teletype connected to MECC in Mankato. We thought it was funny that you could whistle into the modem to get it to try and connect (the modem was literally a box with cups for sticking the phone handset into). The terminal had a paper tape feed. We would have a BANG ready to feed in when it asked. We saved all our own programs on paper tape feed. When I went to Winona State University then next year we still connected to MECC, only now we moved up to punch cards. All our programming all 4 years was saved on punch cards. When programs were due towards the end of the quarter there would be sometimes a 2 hour wait from when you fed your cards in until you got your response from Mankato.
In the late 60's I would eat a can of spinach myself after school. It was my favorite. I ate it with apple cider vinegar on it. I can only figure it was because of Popeye. In 1977 when I came out of anesthesia from surgery, I sang "I'm Popeye the Sailor Man" to those in the room.
Slashdot Mirror
Still programming in RPG, but it "isn't your daddy's RPG"
There are still lots of companies that use it in IBM midrange shops. One company I was at until 2007 had their computer crash only once since 1992 - the reason was that the UPS batteries were dead and they shut down power for a company renovation. The IBM i (once called the AS/400) has been a reliable workhorse since its inception. Many companies that have it won't give it up because of that.
I can communicate with any other system and do it with a smaller programming staff than most shops. I have mostly been an employee, as I am now, but spent almost 7 years as a consultant around Columbus Ohio also.
In rural Ohio you can find Sprint stores in most towns. The closest T-Mobile store to me is 45 minutes away.
I cannot remember which one it was, but one part of one comic had a way to change lights that was quite interesting. If more than one car is coming to an intersection and the light was red, you could put in money to make it change. The person who put in the most got it to change. Many times it would only take a penny, but if many rich people were in a hurry it could start a bidding war. I always think of this when I come to stupidly controlled red lights where I am the only car.
On another note, I was just in Norway and Denmark for 2 weeks. I rented a car and in most areas I was at there were no lights or stop signs. Almost all traffic was controlled by roundabouts where needed and places where there would have been a stop sign in the US, there was a yield sign in Norway. I liked it.
"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent..."
I had a house where I had to take off a metal return vent cover in order to put a temporary cupboard base in. I put a mouse trap near it and a mouse got caught by just one arm and fell into the long metal return duct. It kept flipping around in there making an awful racket! I had to take the end cap off the duct and reach in about 15 feet with kids toys hooked together (I had to put them together in pieces since the end cap was near a wall) to pull out this mouse & trap. It took quite a while and the entire time it was like someone banging on the duct work all through the house.
We have the opposite problem. I think 40 is the youngest programmer on our staff of about 10 people who are programming. I have jokingly told lots of people that my skills are so out of date that they are back in demand. I think it is similar with COBOL programmers. My skills aren't really out of date, they just aren't the "sexy" jobs in languages most people think of. I like my job and the people I work with and we get a lot of work done that drives a thriving business.
Not that we take any old "old" person. We just had a 60 year old on a 60 day "try and buy" and he couldn't stay awake - blamed it on medication. He did a lousy job also so didn't even last the full 60 days. We find it hard to find anyone qualified and the ones we do try aren't young. None the less, it is a great platform.
But according to the Hulk Hogan / Gawker trial, it was NOT 10 inches
Yes, I love technology
But not as much as you, you see
But I still love technology
Always and forever
I worked at a place used a vendors software that also had a server based version. They wanted us to switch but the owner said "Our current servers crash often, but our iSeries has been up since 1993 and has not gone down except when the power was cut and we found out our UPS batteries were dead." At the time, that was 13 years of steady processing.
But it is the sows that feed the young, not the boars!
I like using a low credit limit card for most transactions just for the very reason that I lack trust in the system.
There is still a large community using it and supporting it.
A user calls and says they have a problem with program x so they call me. When they get there, they cannot reproduce the bug. We assume that the software know that it is whipped once I come into the picture so it fixes itself. You would not believe how many times this has happened over 30+ years.
I use my Blu-ray burner all the time. Verbatim 25 GBs for about 30 cents each.
Where do you get such a deal?
And not enough cowbell! We need more cowbell!
83 is pretty long
I am over 50 and with with another programmer who is over 50. I had thought about it if it got cheap, but then my "neighbor" told me he regrets doing it. He still uses 2 pairs of glasses. He uses readers you can buy anywhere while sitting at his desk and a half reader (nothing on top, reader on bottom) type of bifocal for all other times. He spent a few thousand to have it done and they didn't tell him it doesn't correct for the most common part of getting older, namely being able to see close things.
I would think this would work better for deflector shields than the moon swirls in the next article, but maybe the "swirlies" are related.
I completely disagree with you. I have used MSE on ALL my familys machines since it came out and I have yet to have it fail and yet to notice ANY slowing of my system other anti-virus programs caused. Any it is approved by my work VPN AV check. I am completely satisfied with it.
I can only hope the "liberal-minded activists" are moving from Ohio. We can use less of them here. I am always embarassed for people with Obama bumper stickers still on their car.
I saw this in the news yesterday and contacted a friend who worked there for a while. He said the company is a billionaire's toy shop and nothing has ever come to final production. He thought this project was shelved and told me to not hold my breath.
I have found that Feit Electric makes the worst CFL bulbs there are. We are lucky if they last a year - not the 5-7 years they advertise. I still buy them because our local electric companies in Ohio subsidize them and they are quite often under 50 cents apiece.
She is amazed how many people are "full code" (meaning the staff must do anything to save them), even when they are very old and frail. It is usually the family that wants this. They don't realize what this will mean in reality. It means that if their heart stops they must do chest compressions which will probably break the persons ribs when they are old and fragile.
I played in 1977 at North Branch HS. We had a computer programming class with the teletype connected to MECC in Mankato. We thought it was funny that you could whistle into the modem to get it to try and connect (the modem was literally a box with cups for sticking the phone handset into). The terminal had a paper tape feed. We would have a BANG ready to feed in when it asked. We saved all our own programs on paper tape feed. When I went to Winona State University then next year we still connected to MECC, only now we moved up to punch cards. All our programming all 4 years was saved on punch cards. When programs were due towards the end of the quarter there would be sometimes a 2 hour wait from when you fed your cards in until you got your response from Mankato.
In the late 60's I would eat a can of spinach myself after school. It was my favorite. I ate it with apple cider vinegar on it. I can only figure it was because of Popeye. In 1977 when I came out of anesthesia from surgery, I sang "I'm Popeye the Sailor Man" to those in the room.