SPARTA News April 2013

April 2013

SPARTA President’s Corner

by Brad Carson

To paraphrase from Jimi Hendrix, "Pollen Haze, Pollen Haze...", April is here and so is all the pine pollen of springtime. This is the time of year where everyone here has the same color car, pine pollen yellow-green! There is no escaping it, you just have to get used to it and wait for the "April Showers" to wash it all away.

Last month Duane Reller and Zamir Gonzalez from IBM came to visit us and discuss the latest technology in the System/z arena. As always they had a lot of good information for us to digest. Some of the analytics offerings would be a good fit for our company if we could convince some of our informatics folks that, with the source data in DB2 on the mainframe, let's utilize one of these analytics offerings on the IBM mainframe. This would be a better solution (to me anyway) then moving all this data off platform and into another environment. Hopefully someone will wake-up to these facts soon.

Finally I can say our DB2 V10 project is near the end. We've migrated our last two subsystems (DBQ for Billing QA, and DSN for Billing Production) to V10 New Function Mode. If we get through April month end processing, then we can close this long drawn out project. DB2 upgrades for us are the worst projects because they affect so many other systems and a number of people here don't want to do the required upgrades to keep current. Our next projects on this platform will be the replacement of some DB2 tools and system monitors. After that we will be looking at CICS/TS V5. This should make for an interesting summer and fall.

Now that z/OS 1.13 is running well on all LPARs, we can get back to getting z/VM V6.2 running again. This has been idle for a while, but I'm hearing about some zLinux workload that will be coming our way (at last!) and would like to be handling this on z/VM 6.2. It is looking interesting and I'll let you know how things are going in future newsletters.

This month our speaker will be Laura Knapp from AES to talk about Cloud Computing Performance Factors and the Mobile Workforce. I look forward to seeing you all on the 30th at LabCorp in RTP.


Future Speakers
(subject to change)


Apr. 30 Cloud Computing Performance Factors by Laura Knapp of Applied Expert Systems
May 21 IOF Updates by Jim Ott of Triangle Systems

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 Ron Pimblett by phone as noted below.

2012-2013 SPARTA
Board of Directors

Brad Carson - President
LabCorp 336-436-8294
3060 S. Church St.
Burlington, NC 27215

Ron Pimblett - Vice President
DTS Software 919-833-8426
4350 Lassiter at North Hills Ave, Suite 235
Raleigh, NC 27609

Mike Lockey - Secretary
Guilford Co. Information Services 336-641-6235
201 N. Eugene St.
Greensboro, NC 27401

Tommy Thomas - Treasurer
LabCorp 336-436-4178
3060 S. Church St. 919-361-7267
Burlington, NC 27215

Ed Webb - Communications Director
SAS Institute 919-531-4162
SAS Campus Drive
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 usually 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 Tommy Thomas. Tommy 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 e-Mailings

The SPARTA policy is to e-mail a monthly notice to our SPARTA-L Group. The newsletter is posted to the website about five (5) days before each meeting so you can prepare. The SPARTA-L Group is maintained by Brad Carson; if you have corrections or problems receiving your meeting notice, contact Brad at 336-436-8294.

December 2012 “CBT Tape” Shareware Online

The directory and files from the latest CBT tape V485 (dated December 16, 2012) are available from www.cbttape.org.

If you need help obtaining one or more files, contact Brad Carson at LabCorp or Ed Webb at SAS (see Board of Director’s list for contact info).

Minutes of the March 26, 2013 Meeting

•Meeting was called to order at 7:00 PM by Brad Carson, the Chapter President.
•The meeting was held at LabCorp in RTP, N.C.
•Twenty (20) people were present of which thirteen (13) were members.
•Everyone in the room introduced themselves, told where they worked, and briefly described their job functions.
•The minutes of the February 26, 2013 meeting was approved as published in the March 2013 newsletter.
•Tommy Thomas, the Chapter Treasurer, gave the Treasurer's Report. As of February 28, 2013, the balance is $525.84. Motion was made and approved to accept the Treasurer's Report as published in the March 2013 newsletter.

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 available. To access the SPARTA Web page, point your Web browser to this site: http://www.spartanc.org. Please send any comments or suggestions about the Web page to Mike Lockey. Be sure to check the Web page every once in a while to see any new or changed information.

•Brad Carson reminded everyone to leave the LabCorp conference room clean.

•Future Speakers and Topics (subject to change based on internal politics, budget, the weather):

If you have suggestions about speakers and topics, contact Ron Pimblett (919-833-8426).

•The April SPARTA meeting will be April 30 at LabCorp in RTP.

•Food for the April 2013 meeting will be Pizza.

NEW BUSINESS

•Thanks to LabCorp and Brad and Tommy for hosting the February meeting.

•Send any e-mail address changes to Brad Carson so he can update the SPARTA Listserv.

•Although a nomination committee and chairperson have not been formed, officer elections will be held next month. See Brad Carson to volunteer for an office.

•The 2013 dues are due ($30). See Tommy Thomas.

•The business portion of the meeting ended at 7:50 p.m.

PRESENTATION

• Presentation about the latest IBM System z Technologies by Duane Reller and Zamir Gonzalez of IBM.

• Future Directions (Major Emphasis Points)
- Moving past System Availability emphasis into Application Availability / Uptime.
- Using Flash Memory
- Controlling Expenses

• zBX Options
- 150+ installed by mid year 2012
- 1,100 maximum blades in 1 box available
- 140 new IBM accounts
- Financing of servers up 12%
- 36% of systems have IFLs
- 20% of systems are running Linux

• Historical Change And Option Timelines
- EC12 into zEC12 change chart reviewed
- Batmobile motif
- 30% faster in the same footprint
- Superior Security
- Increase of 4 to 6 cores
- 101 configurable cores
- 20% more Linux systems
- 2 GB pages
- New Encryption cards
- z/VM 6.2 with live guest migrations (SSI)
- 5.5 GHz chips (fastest in the market)
- New emphasis on making internals work faster instead of faster CPUs
- Run instructions out of order
- Re-order storage access
- More Multi Threading
- Water Cooling Option
- New Transaction Execution
- Flash express and IBM z aware
- Designed to Prevent hardware errors (increase application availability)
- z/OS V1.13 to use Flash Express, Reduce latency, Easier to setup

• What Is Flash Express?
- Like Extended Storage
- 6.4 TB maximum size
- Encrypted

• Smart Message Monitoring
- Proactive Analysis
- Compare Norm to New Event
- Uses Self Learning
- Find Anomalies
- Runs in a Special Engine
- Uses Cases for Machine Learning
- Monitoring, Detecting, Frequency, Reporting
- Improve Problem Diagnostics

• Hardware and Software Enhancements
- Security built in zEC12
- Encryption for z/OS, z/VM, and z/VSE
- Flexible Connectivity
- New Java Enhancements
- New Cloud Capability
- New Application Compilers (that run faster)
- CICS Compute Grid (cloud usage)
- New CICS 5.1
- Faster C++ Compiler Execution
- SaaS is the target (Software as a Service)
- 23 new instructions to make programs run faster
- DB2 Analysis Accelerator

• To Make Applications Run Faster
- PL1 - 31% faster
- C / C++ 23 % faster
- COBOL also faster
- COBOL with XML and JAVA support
- z/VM V 6.3 Announcements
- DB2 V11

• zBX - SOD (Statement Of Direction)
- Remove Half Duplex option on 100 Mb TCP/IP cards
- Remove FICON Connectivity option
- z10 Support Withdrawn by June 30, 2013

• Contact Information
- Duane Reller - 919-720-7304 Email: reller@us.ibm.com
- Zamir Gonzalez - 919-225-1974 Email: gonzalez@us.ibm.com

• The presentations ended about 9:00 PM.

Treasurer’s Report for April 2013

contributed by Tommy Thomas

The balance in the account is $1,045.63 as of April 11, 2013.

Financial Report
3/01/2013 through 04/11/2013

Items of Interest


SPARTA Schedule and Menu for 2013

contributed by Tommy Thomas and Chris Blackshire

Apr. 30 - Pizza
May 21 - Chicken
June 25 - Subs
July 30 - BarBQ
Aug. 27 - DBAP Buy Your Own
Sept. 24 - Pizza
Oct. 29 - Chicken
Nov. 19 - Subs
Dec. 31 - No Meeting, Happy Holidays


Unsupported TASID Tool Revived!

contributed by Ed Webb

For many years, an unsupported tool named TASID from IBM provided an ISPF-based view of system info, such as APF Lists, LinkList, and LPA Lists as well as listing data sets allocated to your TSO session (its original purpose). Written and informally supported by RTP IBMer Doug Nadel, TASID evolved into the DDLIST command in ISPF (also accessed via TSO ISRDDN). DDLIST is a powerful system query tool.

When ISPF development moved from RTP to Australia, Doug went elsewhere in IBM and the TASID tool was no longer updated. And, at least on our later z/OS systems, mostly abended.

Now the Aussies have come through and revised the TASID tool. Download V5.20 (for z/OS V1 R10 and later) dated February 2013 from here. Here’s a brief description:

“The TASID system monitor allows you to view system activity on a z/OS system. This includes information about active address spaces (batch jobs, started tasks, TSO users, and system tasks), ENQ activity and contention, initiator status on JES2 systems, and so on. Note that there are some options that might not behave consistently or operate correctly on every level of z/OS. All available documentation is contained in the help panels, which you can access by pressing the HELP function key when on any panel within TASID.”

Two versions are provided: one broken into a load module and a separate panel library; the other is just a single load module with embedded panels.

We just tossed the load module embedded with panels into our local Linklist library. Now we just issue TSO TASID whenever we are in ISPF. How it differs from DDLIST remains to be discovered but TASID may be updated faster than DDLIST and may be a testbed for future DDLIST enhancements. Give it a try.


Make Hotel Reservations for SHARE 2013 in Boston in August

contributed by Ed Webb

Though Brad Carson and the rest of the Core Technologies Project in the MVS Program at SHARE are just finalizing the schedule, it’s not too early to make your room reservations for SHARE in Boston August 11-16, 2013. Spread across two hotels, the Sheraton and the Marriott, near the Hynes Convention Center in the Back Bay district of Boston, SHARE in August will be focused on the upcoming next release of z/OS, Version 2.1.

Available in September 2013 after a one year delay, z/OS 2.1 promises some exciting enhancements (SRCHFOR across files in a z/OS Unix directory, for example). And Boston is a great place to visit (in spite of recent events around the Marathon), full of shopping and good restaurants in mall between the Sheraton and the Marriott as well as history just down the street at the Boston Commons.

And online registration for SHARE is now available as well. Note that Early Bird rates end June 28, 2013. Just click here for the best education a z/OS expert or novice can get!


REXX Offers Tools for Automated Processing of SMF Data

contributed by Ed Webb

If you are a REXX aficionado, or just curious how to process SMF data (without the benefits of Barry Merrill’s MXG, based on the SAS programming language), then check this article (and the earlier part 1) from IBM Systems Magazine.

This article is a good basic introduction to how to use REXX functions to handle various SMF data structures, and there’s a good amount of sample code. Even if you do need REXX to process SMF data, you’ll probably learn about a useful REXX function or two that’ll help in the future.


Holey Optochip is IBM’s New SuperHero Chip

contributed by Ed Webb

At first I thought this article in IBM Systems Magazine was an April Fool’s joke, but apparently not.

“IBM Research recently announced the Holey Optochip, an optical chip capable of transferring a terabit—or 1 trillion bits—of data in a second. Why is this significant? According to Clint Schow, IBM Researcher and manager of the Optical Link and Systems Design Group, it’s because this type of chip can dramatically cut down on data-transfer times in high-performance computing environments and reduce energy consumption.”

Amazing how drilling a few holes in a chip and shining a light through it can move so much data so fast. Read the whole article here.


Humor


25 Things You Wouldn’t Believe About These Countries

contributed by Chris Blackshire

Depending upon your definition, and whether or not you count Taiwan, there are “approximately” 196 countries in the world as of this writing.  So while you may consider yourself to be a knowledgeable global citizen, and we're sure you are, given the dynamic and complex nature of our planet there are certain to be at least a couple facts on this list that you will find surprising.
 
Here are 25 things that you would not believe about these countries.
 
25: Covers the most time zones – France
If you count everything, including overseas territories, then France claims the title by covering 12 time zones. The United States would be the runner-up with 11 and then Russia with 9.
 
24: Most likely to disappear beneath the waves – Maldives
With all the talks of global warming and rising sea levels, it is the residents of the Maldives that have the greatest reason to fear. With an average height of around 1.8 meters above sea level, their nation is the lowest on earth.
 
23: Most overweight population – Nauru
With over 95% of its population being overweight, the small island nation of Nauru is by far the fattest country on earth. Its obesity epidemic is primarily attributed to the importation of western fast food that coincided with an increased standard of living in the 20th century due to the global popularity of its phosphate exports. It’s almost non sequitur…almost.
 
22: Roads made of coral – Guam
Because Guam doesn’t have any natural sand, but rather coral, the island nation makes its asphalt using a mix of ground coral and oil rather than importing sand from abroad.
 
21: Has 350 sheep for every person – Falkand Islands (UK)
With only about 3,000 people the Falkland Islands are home to approximately half-a million-sheep. Not surprisingly wool is a major export.
 
20: Oldest sovereign state – Egypt
This largely depends upon your definition of a sovereign state but if you are going by first acquisition of sovereignty then Egypt would be the first country in the world to achieve sovereignty based upon the formation of the first dynasty in 3100 BC.
 
19: Most lakes in the world – Canada
With over three million lakes, 9% of Canadian territory is actually fresh water and over 60% of all the lakes in the world are found within its borders.
 
18: Least likely place to meet your neighbor – Mongolia
At 4 people per square mile Mongolia is the least densely populated country on Earth. Compare this to the Mong Kok district of Hong Kong that has the highest population density in the world with 340,000 people per square mile.
 
17: Largest number of tanks – Russia
It is a strange title to hold, but Russia has by far the most tanks of any army in the world (21,000). Unfortunately for the motherland, most of these outdated machines are tributes to its past, and although out numbered (16,000), the United States has a much more advanced tank inventory.
 
16: The land of no rivers – Saudi Arabia
Sounds a bit strange doesn’t it? For a country as big as Saudi Arabia there has to be at least some sort of flowing water. Well, there isn’t. Most of their fresh water comes from desalinization plants or underground reservoirs.
 
15: Youngest population of any country – Niger
Generally the world's youngest country is determined by calculating the portion of the population that is younger than 15. Presently, it is Niger that holds this distinction with roughly half of its population having barely reached puberty (49%).
 
14: Most diverse country in the world – India
In almost every category – culturally, economically, climatically, racially, linguistically, ethnically, and religiously, India is either the most diverse countries in the world, or the runner-up.
 
13: Fastest disappearing nation – Ukraine
With a natural decrease in population of .8% annually, between now and 2050 Ukraine is expected to lose around 30% of its people.
 
12: Most of its citizens live abroad – Malta
After some rough economic times coupled with an increased birth rate, Malta experienced significant immigration. It was so significant that there are now more Maltese living abroad than within the country itself.
 
11: Smaller than Central Park in New York City – Monaco
Although Vatican City is smaller (.17 sq MI) than Monaco (.8 sq MI), unlike Monaco, it doesn’t have any permanent residents which leaves Monaco as the smallest permanently inhabited nation in the world…smaller than Central Park.
 
10: Almost entirely covered in jungle – Suriname
With 91% of its land covered in jungle, Suriname’s half-a-million residents live primarily along the coast near the capital. Only 5% of the population (mainly indigenous people) live inland.
 
9: Almost entirely treeless – Haiti
On the opposite end of the spectrum is Haiti, a country that has been so badly deforested that you can tell where it borders the Dominican Republic by looking at a satellite image (with Haiti being almost treeless in that photo).
 
8: Largest country with NO farms – Singapore
Although there are a number of small nations in the world that show no hint of having an agriculture based economy (take Vatican City for example), Singapore is the largest of these urban city-states.
 
7: Most languages spoken – Papua New Guinea
Although English is its official language, only 1-2% of the population actually speak it. As the most linguistically diverse country in the world, over 820 languages are spoken in Papua New Guinea, or 12% of the world’s total.
 
6: Most educated people – Canada
With 50% of its population having been educated at the post secondary level, Canada easily has the most educated populace in the world. It is followed by Israel at 45% and Japan at 44%.
 
5: The “country desert” – Libya
With 99% of the country covered in desert, Libya is one of the most arid places in the world and in some regions decades may go by without a single drop of rain.
 
4: Least peaceful nation in the world – Somalia
Although for the last three years Iraq has been ranked as the least peaceful country in the world, according to the 'Global Peace Index', Somalia overtook it this year for the top spot.
 
3: Produces most of the world’s oxygen – Russia
Siberia is home to approximately 25% of the world’s forests that span an area larger than the continental United States, making Russia the largest converter of CO2 into breathable compounds.
 
2: World’s largest opium producer – Afghanistan
Producing a whopping 95 percent of the world’s opium, not even 10 years of occupation by American forces have slowed down the industry.
 
1: Most people behind bars – United States
When it comes to incarcerating its population, the United States is the world’s uncontested leader. With 2.2 million people behind bars, it has 5% of the world’s population, but 25% of the world’s incarcerated population.
Second: China at 1.5 million.
Third: Russia at 870,000. 


Pun Humor

contributed by Chris Blackshire

·I changed my iPod name to Titanic. It's syncing now.
·I tried to catch some fog. I mist.
·When chemists die, they barium.
·Jokes about German sausage are the wurst.
·A soldier who survived mustard gas and pepper spray is now a seasoned veteran.
·I know a guy who's addicted to brake fluid. He says he can stop any time.
·How does Moses make his tea? Hebrews it.
·I stayed up all night to see where the sun went. Then it dawned on me.
·This girl said she recognized me from the vegetarian club, but I'd never met herbivore.
·I'm reading a book about anti-gravity.  I can't put it down.
·I did a theatrical performance about puns.  It was a play on words.
·They told me I had type A blood, but it was a type-O.
·A dyslexic man walks into a bra.
·PMS jokes aren't funny, period.
·Why were the Indians here first?  They had reservations.
·Class trip to the Coca-Cola factory-- I hope there's no pop quiz.
·The Energizer bunny arrested and charged with battery.
·I didn't like my beard at first. Then it grew on me.
·Did you hear about the cross eyed teacher who lost her job because she couldn't control her pupils?
·When you get a bladder infection, urine trouble.
·What does a clock do when it's hungry?  It goes back four seconds.
·I wondered why the baseball was getting bigger. Then it hit me!
·Broken pencils are pointless.
·What do you call a dinosaur with a extensive vocabulary? A thesaurus.
·England has no kidney bank, but it does have a Liverpool .
·I used to be a banker, but then I lost interest.
·I dropped out of communism class because of lousy Marx.
·All the toilets in New York's police stations have been stolen.  Police have nothing to go on.
·I got a job at a bakery because I kneaded dough.
·Haunted French pancakes give me the crepes.
·Velcro - what a rip off!
·Cartoonist found dead in home. Details are sketchy.
·Venison for dinner? Oh deer!
·Earthquake in Washington obviously government's fault.
·I used to think I was indecisive, but now I'm not so sure. 

Membership Information

Don’t Forget the Next SPARTA Meeting

Tuesday, April 26, 2013

7 p.m.

LabCorp in the RTP

Free Food: Pizza, Drink, Dessert

Program:

Cloud Computing Performance Factors

Speaker:

Laura Knapp of AES Technologies

SPARTA News
P.O. Box 13194
Research Triangle Park, NC 27709-3194

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