Comments on: Where are all the mainframe bloggers? At BMC it seems. http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/ An industry analyst blog looking at software ecosystems and convergence Fri, 03 Feb 2012 10:35:40 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Nick Manu http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-62072 Nick Manu Mon, 16 Apr 2007 14:46:33 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-62072 please add Dale Vecchio, an analyst at Gartner Inc., a "fine" analyst on "mainframes" and please believe I am not Dale, by no means, but a "poor & old" zOS & DB2 architect, ex-IBM systprog and dba, conultant and free-lancer (the folk you're missing, with 30+ years of experience) stranded @ an insurance company actually running IMS, CICS and DB2 on small 600 mips box and decided to bet all its eggs on MS/HP (a deal IBM lost @ c-level, when J2EE lost to .NET v1) and should be IBM-free by 2012. After investigating all EAI, EII and the rest of the SOA soup, that IBM sells so bad (that it can loose to aggressive MS/HP sales) I sit back and wait and see how they will manage .NET applications on SQL Server when they will go "live" - the only chance will be they should not have to scale (i.e. less customers probably), because MS is NOT selling a full blown "production" ripe Windows Server 2Kx ... I wonder who are the young "Lancelots" ready to save IBM's flagship ... Please let me quote Peter Armstrong again "The thing that really cheeses me off though is when people ignore 30 years of experience. Running mainframes has taught us how to handle processes like Change Management, Service Levels, Backup and Recovery, Security and many others. Ignoring what has been learnt here, which many customers and educational establishments seem prone to do, strikes me as crazy. One customer I met puts every new employee (who thinks C++, Java, Linux and CTL-ALT-DEL are the centre of the universe) into the mainframe department for 6 months. Not to learn MVS or JCL, but to learn how to run a production environment correctly." Please save the "private" Ryan from the MS/HP "hell" (lol!) please add Dale Vecchio, an analyst at Gartner Inc.,
a “fine” analyst on “mainframes” and please believe I am not Dale, by no means, but a “poor & old” zOS & DB2 architect, ex-IBM systprog and dba, conultant and free-lancer (the folk you’re missing, with 30+ years of experience) stranded @ an insurance company actually running IMS, CICS and DB2 on small 600 mips box and decided to bet all its eggs on MS/HP (a deal IBM lost @ c-level, when J2EE lost to .NET v1) and should be IBM-free by 2012. After investigating all EAI, EII and the rest of the SOA soup, that IBM sells so bad (that it can loose to aggressive MS/HP sales) I sit back and wait and see
how they will manage .NET applications on SQL Server when they will go “live” – the only chance will be they should not have to scale (i.e. less customers probably), because MS is NOT selling a full blown “production” ripe Windows Server 2Kx … I wonder who are the young “Lancelots” ready to save IBM’s flagship … Please let me quote Peter Armstrong again
“The thing that really cheeses me off though is when people ignore 30 years of experience. Running mainframes has taught us how to handle processes like Change Management, Service Levels, Backup and Recovery, Security and many others. Ignoring what has been learnt here, which many customers and educational establishments seem prone to do, strikes me as crazy. One customer I met puts every new employee (who thinks C++, Java, Linux and CTL-ALT-DEL are the centre of the universe) into the mainframe department for 6 months. Not to learn MVS or JCL, but to learn how to run a production environment correctly.” Please save the “private” Ryan from the MS/HP “hell” (lol!)

]]> By: Rick Molera http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-61677 Rick Molera Mon, 16 Apr 2007 03:56:59 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-61677 zSERIES bloggers??? Senior Citizens Don't Blog!!! Regrettably, we (i.e., Big Iron proletariat) are now just a bunch of old folks, eagerly awaiting retirement -excluding myself, 44 year old going on 23 years of in-depth MAINFRAME work experience. One who never succumbed to the simplicity of a new world order: PC-driven business paradigm. Believe me, today's mainframers are way far removed from your average “techno-blogger head” GEN XYZers. They'd be hard pressed to correctly define, “BLOGGING”. Much less, go out and create their own BLOG, on a “website”?? Nevertheless, THANK YOU very much for pointing out the power of “z” server technology and IBM's painfully poor record when it comes to promoting this, “built for the business world” high-tech, high powered, all everything, computing enigma machine (a.k.a., “Dinosaur”, “Legacy”, “Dead” technology). ;-] Rick Molera z/OS DB2 Engineer – a.k.a., Dinosaur zSERIES bloggers??? Senior Citizens Don’t Blog!!!

Regrettably, we (i.e., Big Iron proletariat) are now just a bunch of old folks, eagerly awaiting retirement -excluding myself, 44 year old going on 23 years of in-depth MAINFRAME work experience. One who never succumbed to the simplicity of a new world order: PC-driven business paradigm.

Believe me, today’s mainframers are way far removed from your average “techno-blogger head” GEN XYZers. They’d be hard pressed to correctly define, “BLOGGING”. Much less, go out and create their own BLOG, on a “website”??

Nevertheless, THANK YOU very much for pointing out the power of “z” server technology and IBM’s painfully poor record when it comes to promoting this, “built for the business world” high-tech, high powered, all everything, computing enigma machine (a.k.a., “Dinosaur”, “Legacy”, “Dead” technology).

;-]

Rick Molera
z/OS DB2 Engineer – a.k.a., Dinosaur

]]> By: Marc Wambeke http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-39805 Marc Wambeke Tue, 20 Mar 2007 07:35:36 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-39805 Hi, I started a mainframe blog some months ago and today I accidentally stumbled across this thread. I must say I haven't got the impression much has changed since. The ones that were there are still around, but I don't see many new ones appearing. If you want to check out mine : http://mainframe-watch-belgium.blogspot.com Hi, I started a mainframe blog some months ago and today I accidentally stumbled across this thread. I must say I haven’t got the impression much has changed since. The ones that were there are still around, but I don’t see many new ones appearing.
If you want to check out mine : http://mainframe-watch-belgium.blogspot.com

]]> By: James Governor http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-406 James Governor Fri, 15 Sep 2006 20:00:58 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-406 Thanks Willie - your blog is great, if geeky. Tracy - to be fair the mainframe actually does run Linux and even Unix workloads, so its not completely alien. I agree about touchability though -and that is something i regularly hassle IBM about. Your feedback is appreciated - and like i say - if you want to feel a mainframe let me know, and i will try and sort a trip out for you to one of the IBM centers. To be fair - the Nexxar consolidation was only 80 or so Intel servers-so its not just for the huge firms. and your blog design is really slick! Thanks Willie – your blog is great, if geeky.

Tracy – to be fair the mainframe actually does run Linux and even Unix workloads, so its not completely alien. I agree about touchability though -and that is something i regularly hassle IBM about.

Your feedback is appreciated – and like i say – if you want to feel a mainframe let me know, and i will try and sort a trip out for you to one of the IBM centers.

To be fair – the Nexxar consolidation was only 80 or so Intel servers-so its not just for the huge firms. and your blog design is really slick!

]]> By: Willie Favero http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-405 Willie Favero Fri, 15 Sep 2006 12:11:07 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-405 I guess I'm not all that quick when it comes to tracking down good stuff to read sometimes.. It only took me a year to find this thread. You need to check out a few of the blogs over at <a href="http://www.ittoolbox.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.ittoolbox.com/</a> There are a couple of us old dinosaurs’ blogging there on a variety of subjects related to the mainframe. My blog ( <a href="http://blogs.ittoolbox.com/database/db2zos" rel="nofollow">http://blogs.ittoolbox.com/database/db2zos</a> ) covers DB2 for z/OS and has been kicking around for a little over a year. Stop by a give a few of us a read. Willie I guess I’m not all that quick when it comes to tracking down good stuff to read sometimes.. It only took me a year to find this thread.

You need to check out a few of the blogs over at http://www.ittoolbox.com/ There are a couple of us old dinosaurs’ blogging there on a variety of subjects related to the mainframe. My blog ( http://blogs.ittoolbox.com/database/db2zos ) covers DB2 for z/OS and has been kicking around for a little over a year. Stop by a give a few of us a read.

Willie

]]> By: Tracy Reed http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-404 Tracy Reed Thu, 14 Sep 2006 06:13:26 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-404 "Because Unix isn't scalable enough [in terms of data management]". What is Unix in this context? I am trying to learn about mainframe technologies and where to apply them but the mainframe is still completely inaccessable to the average IT manager. I don't know where I can go to see one, I don't know who has one (because only big shops tend to have them and they don't talk about them), I can't get one to train on. I'm definitely not going to recommend a mainframe solution without having used one no matter how much money IBM tells me I can save by trading in my 100 Linux x86_64 Linux boxes. I also don't have a million dollar budget. Or even a few hundred thousand. And if you don't have that kind of money nobody will talk to you about mainframes. The vast majority of computer tasks that businesses have are really not very big. Few people need an 18 wheeler. I often drive a scooter. Linux/Unix/Windows will always be more popular than the mainframe because it is more appropriate for the vast majority of tasks out there. At least until we all get enough bandwidth to be able to get rid of our small private server rooms and rent/buy time on a mainframe for our workloads. “Because Unix isn’t scalable enough [in terms of data management]“.

What is Unix in this context?

I am trying to learn about mainframe technologies and where to apply them but the mainframe is still completely inaccessable to the average IT manager. I don’t know where I can go to see one, I don’t know who has one (because only big shops tend to have them and they don’t talk about them), I can’t get one to train on. I’m definitely not going to recommend a mainframe solution without having used one no matter how much money IBM tells me I can save by trading in my 100 Linux x86_64 Linux boxes. I also don’t have a million dollar budget. Or even a few hundred thousand. And if you don’t have that kind of money nobody will talk to you about mainframes.

The vast majority of computer tasks that businesses have are really not very big. Few people need an 18 wheeler. I often drive a scooter. Linux/Unix/Windows will always be more popular than the mainframe because it is more appropriate for the vast majority of tasks out there. At least until we all get enough bandwidth to be able to get rid of our small private server rooms and rent/buy time on a mainframe for our workloads.

]]> By: James Governor http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-403 James Governor Wed, 13 Sep 2006 16:02:21 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-403 Hello Colin - the more the merrier mate, expect some linkage asap. Hello Colin – the more the merrier mate, expect some linkage asap.

]]> By: colin http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-402 colin Wed, 13 Sep 2006 01:43:27 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-402 Hi, James. Sorry for being so late to the party, but we've just recently put a blog together intended for mainframe pros (@ <a href="http://www.mainframeweekly.com)." rel="nofollow">http://www.mainframeweekly.com).</a> I've referenced this post (despite it's age-- good posts are timeless) recently and just wanted to thank you for the great info. Hope you'll find our new kid on the block useful; and keep on fighting the good fight. -colin Hi, James. Sorry for being so late to the party, but we’ve just recently put a blog together intended for mainframe pros (@ http://www.mainframeweekly.com).
I’ve referenced this post (despite it’s age– good posts are timeless) recently and just wanted to thank you for the great info.

Hope you’ll find our new kid on the block useful; and keep on fighting the good fight.

-colin

]]> By: Mark Cathcart http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-401 Mark Cathcart Fri, 16 Dec 2005 19:37:45 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-401 Well I started my IBM web site back in 1995 and part of the then revolutionary IBM EMEA website, along with one or two others. The initiative was kicked off by Nigel Dessau who went on from being a humble salesman, to being something in IBM EMEA marketing, to being a VP in Systems Group marketing in Corporate HQ and laterly left IBM for STK, who were recently aquired by Sun and last I heard Nigel was in charge of tapes ;-0 Anyway, in '96 we got a letter of commendation from the UK Deptment of Trade and Industry for being a leading UK company on the 'net. Right up until 2002, I regulary posted presentations, white papers and news on mainframe stuff in blog style. Unfortunately in the old days you just had to ftp html and content over to a server to get it published, now they have a whole Java client that has change control, approval cycles and more. I just don't have time to learn the client etc. but will in the coming months as we lead up to the availability of the Resource Discovery Services and especially on zSeries. Now, if only I could remember who the journalist was that interviewed me for the first issue of Information Week in the UK, subject of the article, mainframes and the Internet. Ahh yes, those were the days eh James! Well I started my IBM web site back in 1995 and part of the then revolutionary IBM EMEA website, along with one or two others.

The initiative was kicked off by Nigel Dessau who went on from being a humble salesman, to being something in IBM EMEA marketing, to being a VP in Systems Group marketing in Corporate HQ and laterly left IBM for STK, who were recently aquired by Sun and last I heard Nigel was in charge of tapes ;-0

Anyway, in ’96 we got a letter of commendation from the UK Deptment of Trade and Industry for being a leading UK company on the ‘net. Right up until 2002, I regulary posted presentations, white papers and news on mainframe stuff in blog style.

Unfortunately in the old days you just had to ftp html and content over to a server to get it published, now they have a whole Java client that has change control, approval cycles and more. I just don’t have time to learn the client etc. but will in the coming months as we lead up to the availability of the Resource Discovery Services and especially on zSeries.

Now, if only I could remember who the journalist was that interviewed me for the first issue of Information Week in the UK, subject of the article, mainframes and the Internet. Ahh yes, those were the days eh James!

]]> By: Michael Weintraub http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2005/07/15/where-are-all-the-mainframe-bloggers-at-bmc-it-seems/comment-page-1/#comment-400 Michael Weintraub Mon, 19 Sep 2005 21:48:00 +0000 http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/wp/?p=290#comment-400 Great post! I have been in this field since 1972 and with all the changes and new "paradigms" (or "paradigmata"?) one word describes the difference between us, the mainframe people and the rest of the world: PRODUCTION. We know. We care. We do things to assure continuity, recoverability, good performance under growing loads, central management (who had this grand idea that every user can be a system guru?) and priorities. I have been so far totally unsuccessful in getting approval(s) for a non-paid, 45 minutes lecture on this one word at any of the german universities. Educators do not seem to be interested in the real world. With known results like Java, OO, others, too numerous to mention. Fads. Oh, and relational databases, my hobby (most business problems are by nature hierarchical...) Enough ranting... Write what you think? Thanks Great post!
I have been in this field since 1972 and with all the changes and new “paradigms” (or “paradigmata”?) one word describes the difference between us, the mainframe people and the rest of the world: PRODUCTION. We know. We care. We do things to assure continuity, recoverability, good performance under growing loads, central management (who had this grand idea that every user can be a system guru?) and priorities.
I have been so far totally unsuccessful in getting approval(s) for a non-paid, 45 minutes lecture on this one word at any of the german universities. Educators do not seem to be interested in the real world. With known results like Java, OO, others, too numerous to mention. Fads. Oh, and relational databases, my hobby (most business problems are by nature hierarchical…)

Enough ranting… Write what you think?
Thanks

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