SPARTA News September 2003
September 2003
SPARTA Chapter President’s Corner
- by Brad Carson
September is here and I hope everyone survived hurricane Isabel. Here at LabCorp we had a four-hour power outage and number of remote sites go down, mostly in the tidewater area of Virginia. At home we just had a lot of leaves and branches around, but I have a tree in the backyard that should be removed (looks a little too close to the house for comfort).
We're finally beginning to move on the CPU replacement front. Right now it looks like the 9672-T26 system in Burlington is going to be
moved to a 9672-R36, but we will keep the T26 around to load z/VM and LINUX on. The HDS system looks like it will be replaced with a 9672 later this year. Oh well, we'll be able to run z/OS 1.4 and 1.5 on them but nothing higher. At least it's a step in the right direction.
We are still fighting our little battles with Debug Tool in CICS and the S613-04 abends reading certain virtual tape volumes. On top of that our management has decided that no changes to production can be made without the approval of the Sr. VP of Operations (or one of his designated minions). This increased paperwork has slowed us down a bit, so now we get asked "Haven't you gotten xxx done yet?" quite often. Gee isn't mind numbing paper work fun...
This month we will have a presentation on "SHARE in Washington DC" by Brad Carson (Hey that's me). I look forward to seeing you all on the 30th at LabCorp RTP. BarBQ, drinks, and dessert will be provided.
Future Speakers
(subject to change)
Sept. 30 - SHARE Conference Report by Pamela Tant of DTS Software and Brad Carson of LabCorp
Oct. 28 - SAS 9.1 and the Mainframe by Ed Webb of SAS
Note: Oct. Meeting will be at SAS in Cary
Nov. 25 - IP v6 by a network expert from Cisco
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 as noted below.
2003-2004 SPARTA
Board of Directors
Brad Carson - President
LabCorp 919-361-7270
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 336-641-6235
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. 919-361-7267
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.
September 2003 CBT Tape Online
The directory and files from the latest CBT tape V462 (dated September 15, 2003) 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 August 26th, 2003 Meeting
•Meeting was called to order at 7:00 PM by Tommy Thomas, the Chapter Treasurer. Brad Carson was unable to attend the meeting.
•Ten (10) people were present; nine (9) were members.
•Everyone in the room introduced themselves, told where they worked, and briefly described their job function.
•Minutes of the July 2003 meeting were accepted as published in the August 2003 newsletter.
•Tommy Thomas, the Chapter Treasurer, gave the Treasurer’s report. As of August 26, 2003, the balance is $1216.33.
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.
•You can access the SPARTA Web site, just point your Web browser to this URL: http://www.spartanc.org. Please send any comments or suggestions about the SPARTA website to Mike Lockey. Be sure to check our website every once in a while to see any new or changed information.
•Tommy Thomas reminded everyone to continue to make sure the conference room is clean before we leave the meeting.
NEW BUSINESS
•Future Speakers and Topics:
September 2003 - SHARE Conference Report
October 2003 - TBA
November 2003 - TBA
Other ideas:
- New release of IOF - Triangle Systems
- CMG Conference - Jim Horne of Lowe's
If you have suggestions about speakers and topics, contact Duane Reaugh.
•Food for the September 2003 meeting will be BarBQ, sodas, and dessert.
•The September SPARTA meeting will be held at LabCorp in RTP.
•Thanks to Tommy Thomas of LabCorp for hosting the July meeting.
•The business portion of the meeting ended at 7:45 p.m.
•Gil Segal of Sapiens International presented a Sapiens Technology Brief. Topics included:
Performing transactions at the speed of business
Maintaining integrity: the first "rule" of any successful business
Sapiens eMerge technology: converting business logic into intuitive applications
WebSphere platform: forging ahead with the industry standard
Sapiens solutions architecture: realizing business integrity
Business central
Client central
Integration central
eMerge infrastructure
•The meeting ended at 8:40 p.m.
Treasurer’s Report for September 2003
contributed by Tommy Thomas
The balance in the account is $ 1215.66 as of September 21, 2003.
Financial Report
2/01/2003 through 09/21/2003
INCOME
Opening Balance 672.90
Dues 840.00
Misc. 0.00
TOTAL INCOME $1512.90
EXPENSES
Food 296.57
Petty Cash 0.00
Bank Service Fees 0.00
P.O. Box 0.00
TOTAL EXPENSE $296.57
BANK BALANCE 1216.33
PETTY CASH($160) (00.67)
TOTAL CASH $1215.66
Items of Interest
SPARTA Food Menu for 2003
contributed by Chris Blackshire
September - BarBQ
October - Deli Tray at SAS
November - Chicken
Humor
Amazing or Amzanig!!
contributed by Chris Blackshire
Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. amzanig huh?
Wow! Fifty Years is a Long Time
contributed by Chris Blackshire
Wow! 50 years is a long time!
Do you realize that when you were a kid...
Remote meant a secluded spot off the beaten path.
Cable was something that supported a bridge.
A Video Game was trying to make out what the fuzzy images were on a snowy, black and white 10 inch TV screen.
A Cell Phone was what you used to make your one phone call from jail.
A Calculator was the accountant who did your taxes.
An Airbag was some guy who talked too much.
Digital Computing was counting on your fingers.
High Speed Access was an on-ramp to the freeway.
Surfing was something done on a board in the ocean.
And a Birthday was something you actually looked forward to!
Prison/Work
contributed by Chris Blackshire
Just in case you ever got the two mixed up, this should make things a bit more clear.
IN PRISON...you spend the majority of your time in an 8X10 cell.
AT WORK... you spend the majority of your time in a 6X8 cubicle.
IN PRISON...you get three meals a day.
AT WORK...you only get a break for one meal and you pay for it.
IN PRISON...you get time off for good behavior.
AT WORK...you get more work for good behavior.
IN PRISON...the guard locks and unlocks all the doors for you.
AT WORK...you must carry around a security card and open all the doors for yourself.
IN PRISON...you can watch TV and play games.
AT WORK...you get fired for watching TV and playing games.
IN PRISON...you get your own toilet.
AT WORK...you have to share with some idiot who pees on the seat.
IN PRISON...they allow your family and friends to visit.
AT WORK...you can't even speak to your family.
IN PRISON...all expenses are paid by the taxpayers with no work required.
AT WORK...you get to pay all the expenses to go to work and then they deduct taxes from your salary to pay for prisoners.
IN PRISON...you spend most of your life inside bars wanting to get out.
AT WORK...you spend most of your time wanting to get out and go inside bars.
IN PRISON...you must deal with sadistic wardens.
AT WORK...they are called managers.
***** So why is it again that we work? ****
Don’t Forget the Next SPARTA Meeting
Tuesday, September 30, 2003
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: BarBQ, Drinks, Dessert
Program:
SHARE Conference Report
Speakers:
Pamela Tant of DTS Software
Brad Carson of LabCorp
SPARTA News
P.O. Box 13194
Research Triangle Park, NC 27709-3194
First Class Postage
Phillips Software
