SPARTA News October 2002
October 2002
SPARTA Chapter President’s Corner
- by Brad Carson
Where did the month go? Last month I told you that I was working on setting up SNA Enterprise Extender between our RTP and Burlington LPARs. After much trial and tribulation, we finally have EE running. It is definitely a vast improvement over AnyNet, you don’t have to worry about all those DNS entries (and the paperwork to get them defined). As a benefit for converting to APPN (required for EE), VTAMs in a sysplex can communicate with each other via the coupling facility instead of a CTC. That setup is neat and all connections are automatic (only a VTAMLST model definition is needed).
I’m also still working on converting our CICS regions to MRO. This project is just about complete. During the conversion I’ve enabled program autoinstall, this is another neat addition for CICS (never have to worry about defining MAPSET, PARTITIONSET, or general PROGRAMS). With this enabled and a good DB2 dynamic plan exit, we have reduced the number of definitions in the CSD. I think I can live with a little less work.
During the month I spent three days in Poughkeepsie, NY learning about installing Linux under z/VM, and defining guest LANs under z/VM. Some pretty slick stuff there. I'm looking forward to working (re. playing) with VM again. I'll let you all know how this works out.
This month Pam Tant from DTS Software will be giving us a presentation on her visit to the OS/390 Technical Conference. I look forward to seeing you all on the 29th at LabCorp RTP. Fried chicken, drinks, and dessert will be provided.
Future Speakers
(subject to change)
Oct. 29 z/OS and OS/390 IBM Technical Conference by Pam Tant of DTS Software.
Nov. 19 z/OS 1.3 Migration Experience by Ed Webb of SAS
We need ideas and volunteers for future speakers. Presentations don’t have to be fancy, just informative and interesting. Even a 5 or 10 minute talk can start an interesting interaction. Contact Duane Reaugh by phone or e-mail as noted below.
2002-2003 SPARTA
Board of Directors
Brad Carson - President
LabCorp 919-572-7504
1912 Alexander Drive
Research Triangle Park, NC 27709
Duane Reaugh - Vice President
DTS Software 919-833-8426
2913 Wake Forest Road
Raleigh, NC 27609-7841
Mike Lockey - Secretary
Guilford Co. Information Services 336-412-6235
201 N. Eugene St. 336-227-2021 (Home)
Greensboro, NC 27401
Tommy Thomas - Treasurer
LabCorp 336-436-4178
231 Maple Ave, Koury Ctr 3rd Fl. 919-572-7507
Burlington, NC 27215
Ed Webb - Communications Director
SAS Institute 919-531-4162
SAS Campus Drive 919-362-0232 (Home)
Cary, NC 27513
Meetings
Meetings are scheduled for the last Tuesday evening of each month (except no meeting in December), with optional dinner at 6:15 p.m. and the meeting beginning at 7:00 p.m.
These monthly meetings are held at LabCorp’s Center for Molecular Biology and Pathology (CMBP) near the Research Triangle Park (see last page). Take I-40 to Miami Boulevard and go north. Turn right onto Alexander Drive. Go about a mile or so. Then turn right into LabCorp complex and turn Left to the CMBP Building. In the lobby, sign in as a visitor to see Brad Carson. Brad will escort you to the conference room.
Call for Articles
If you have any ideas for speakers, presentations, newsletter articles, or are interested in taking part in a presentation, PLEASE contact one of the Board of Directors with your suggestions.
Newsletter Mailings
The SPARTA chapter policy is to mail a copy of the monthly chapter newsletter to each SPARTA member, NaSPA national, each advertiser, persons who have requested a copy, and to other chapters who send us a copy of their newsletter. The newsletter is mailed about the 20th of each month so you can prepare for the meeting. The mailing list is maintained by Mike Lockey at (336) 412-6235; if you have corrections or problems receiving your newsletter, call Mike.
Oct. 2002 CBT Tape Online
The directory and files from the latest CBT tape V452 (dated October 2, 2002) are available from www.cbttape.org.
If you need a complete tape, contact Brad Carson at LabCorp or Ed Webb at SAS (see Board of Director’s list for contact info).
Minutes of the September 24th, 2002 Meeting
•Meeting was called to order at 7:00 PM by Brad Carson, the Chapter President.
•Twelve (12) people were present; all were members.
•Everyone in the room introduced themselves, told where they worked, and briefly described their job function.
•Minutes of the August 2002 meeting were accepted as published in the September 2002 newsletter.
•Tommy Thomas, the Chapter Treasurer, gave the Treasurer’s report. As of September 24, 2002, the balance is $924.12.
OLD BUSINESS
•Articles are needed for this newsletter. If you would like to write an article for this newsletter, please contact Ed Webb. Keep in mind that you don’t really need to write the article, it can be an article that you read that you would like to share with the membership.
•The SPARTA Web page is now available. To access the SPARTA Web page, point your Web browser to this site: www.netpath.net/~mlockey/sparta.html. Please send any comments or suggestions about the Web page to Mike Lockey (mlockey@netpath.net). Be sure to check the Web page every once in a while to see any new or changed information.
•Brad reminded everyone to keep the conference room clean; wipe off the conference table and remove all trash when the meeting is over.
NEW BUSINESS
•Future Speakers and Topics:
October 2002 - z/OS and OS/390 IBM Technical Conference by Pam Tant of DTS Software
November 2002 - z/OS 1.3 by Ed Webb of SAS
Other ideas:
- TDMF - Ken Frump
- WLM Goal Mode - Jim Horne
- UNIX Services for OS/390
- IBM New Announcements
- CICS Web Bridge
If you have suggestions about speakers and topics, contact Duane Reaugh.
•Food for the October 2002 meeting will be fried chicken, sodas, and dessert.
•The October SPARTA meeting will be held at LabCorp in RTP.
•There was a discussion on whether the November meeting should be held a week earlier because of the Thanksgiving holiday. It was decided to have the November SPARTA meeting on Tuesday, November 19.
•Thanks to Brad Carson of LabCorp for hosting the September meeting.
•The business portion of the meeting ended at 7:40 p.m.
•Tommy Thomas of LabCorp talked about their conversion from CA-TLMS to IBM RMM. Topics discussed were:
RMM Implementation
Six RMM Milestones
1) Installing the RMM Product
2) Data Base Conversion
3) RMM comes up in Record Mode
4) RMM comes up in Warn Mode
5) Production Cutover
6) Reports
Installing RMM
Data Base Conversion
RMM in Record Mode
RMM in Warning Mode
RMM in Protect Mode
•The meeting was adjourned at 8:40 PM.
Treasurer’s Report for October 2002
contributed by Tommy Thomas
The balance in the account is $ 870.90 as of October 13, 2002.
Financial Report
3/01/2002 through 10/13/2002
INCOME
Opening Balance 693.15
Dues 490.00
Misc. 11.00
TOTAL INCOME $1194.15
EXPENSES
Food 203.47
Petty Cash 160.00
Bank Service Fees 21.00
TOTAL EXPENSE $384.47
BANK BALANCE 809.68
PETTY CASH($160) 61.22
TOTAL CASH $870.90
Items of Interest
IBM Releases New Migration Guide for z/OS V1R4
contributed by Ed Webb
There is a new IBM manual that consolidates information from various redbooks, manuals, WSC flashes, APARs, SHARE presentations, etc. named Migration from OS/390 V2R10 to z/OS V1R4. Check out the online version of the book at http://publibz.boulder.ibm.com/epubs/pdf/e0z2m100.pdf
Humor
Dr. Seuss Explains Why Computers Sometime Crash
contributed by Chris Blackshire
Millions have wondered why a computer crashes. It is usually very technical but maybe this will help.
If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
and the bus is interrupted at a very last resort,
and the access of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
then the socket packet pocket has an error to report.
If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash,
and the double-clicking icon puts your window in the trash,
and your data is corrupted cause the index doesn't hash,
then your situation's hopeless and your system's gonna crash!
If the label on the cable on the table at your house
says the network is connected to the button on your mouse,
but your packets want to tunnel to another protocol,
that's repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall,
and your screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss,
so your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse;
then you may as well reboot and go out with a bang,
'cuz sure as I'm a poet, the sucker's gonna hang!
When the copy of your floppy's getting sloppy in the disk,
and the macro code instructions cause unnecessary risk,
then you'll have to flash the memory and you'll want to RAM your ROM,
then quickly turn the whole thing off
and run to tell your Mom!
WELL! That certainly clears things up for ME!
Things that make you go hmmm...
contributed by Chris Blackshire
The old Cherokee chief sat in his reservation hut, smoking the ceremonial pipe, eyeing the two US government officials sent to interview him.
“Chief Two Eagles,” one official began, “you have observed the white man for many generations, you have seen his wars and his products, you have seen all his progress, and all his problems.”
The chief nodded. The official continued, “Considering recent events, in your opinion, where has the white man gone wrong?”
The chief stared at the government officials for over a minute, and then calmly replied. “When white man found the land, Indians were running it.
* No taxes.
* No debt.
* Plenty buffalo
* Plenty beaver
* Women did the work
* Medicine man free
* Indian men hunted and fished all the time...”
The chief smiled, and added quietly, “White man dumb enough to think he could improve system like that.”
Don’t Forget the Next SPARTA Meeting
Tuesday, October 29, 2002
Location: LabCorp in the RTP
Take I-40 to Miami Boulevard and go north. Turn right onto Alexander Drive. Go about a mile or so. Then turn right into LabCorp complex and turn left to the CMBP Building. In the lobby, sign in as a visitor to see Brad Carson. Brad will escort you to the conference room.
Free Food: Fried Chicken, Drinks, Dessert
Program:
z/OS and OS/390 Technical Conference
Speakers:
Pam Tant of DTS Software
SPARTA News
P.O. Box 13194
Research Triangle Park, NC 27709-3194
First Class Postage
Phillips Software
