Ah, that new 'baby' mainframe smell: IBM shows off z13s

IBM’s new entry-level mainframe, the z13s, makes its debut next month and the company’s press blurb makes for instructive reading, not least because it has very little to say about the actual spec. Instead, there is much enthusiasm about the security features and services assembled for the z Systems server family. The server …

[Snowy]

Lets decrypt the name

z13s i9s is that ZzzZzzzZzzzZzzzz security? or sleeping security?

[Aremmes]

Re: Lets decrypt the name

Now I'm thinking of vuvuzelas protruding from all sides of a server rack, blaring a deafening racket whenever a cat licks its crotch and triggers the intrusion detection system. Why must you do this to me?!?

[Pen-y-gors]

Ah, mainframes...

Having just spent hours going round in circles trying to get a website that works on my local machine to work on the live server, I have happy mnemories of the simplicity of System/370. Come back CICS, COBOL and DB2 - all is forgiven!

[Alistair]

Re: Ah, mainframes...

@Peny-y-gors:

You forgot MQ. Zeke. IMS and that whole laundry list of CA product.

<who me? I KNOW NOTHING about mainframes thanks>

[big_D]

Re: Ah, mainframes...

But you can keep RPG! I had to work on some RPG-II when I was in college. It seemed to take the worst bits of assembler and mix it with the worst bits of COBOL.

[Warm Braw]

CICS, COBOL and DB2 - all is forgiven!

You mean you've found something worse than CICS? Just when they're cutting back on mental health spending....

[TimR]

Re: CICS, COBOL and DB2 - all is forgiven!

I'm getting flashbacks now.... Tables for configuration - that's ok; control blocks for problem determination - need to go lie down!

[tom dial]

Re: CICS, COBOL and DB2 - all is forgiven!

Is a 20- or 30-deep stack trace really better than following the pointers in z/OS control blocks?

In terms of developer productivity (over the full application life cycle) demonstrably better in present web development environments than in the bad old days when programmers used an obligate single threaded language - COBOL - and had only to worry about a small number of inputs and producing a small number of outputs? If so, how much of that is due to better understanding of application system design and project managment?

[FozzyBear]

@ Pen-y

Damn You! Do you realise the hours of therapy now wasted with those repressed memories flooding back.

Need to try a cheaper alternative.... Hand me that bottle of scotch will you

[allthecoolshortnamesweretaken]

If you have to ask the price, you can't afford it.

[Anonymous Coward]

No, I don't really care about the price, just winning the lottery.

Ages ago I was on the IBM website and on a lark configured a collection of System-x, enough to fill a rack. Came to $989,804.00. The next morning I received a note from IBM that I now had a Partner Account Manager to go along with dev account. Now if did win the lottery I'll definitely follow up.

[Captain DaFt]

-the “s" in z13s stands for “security”-

Starts with "z" the absolute last letter in the alphabet, a big "lucky" 13 prominently displayed in the middle, and as usual, security tacked on at the end.

Who handles their marketing/branding?

[ps2os2]

Z13S Mainframes

To be fair the cost of any large machine is complicated.

I think the fair equivalence is check which check mark which items you want from column a then column b etc. etc. etc. add them up and that is the cost. Your IBM rep is able to do it on their HONE system and give you a bottom line figure.

Software alas is a different animal and with this you need to do some wheeling and dealing with both IBM and what ever vendor(s) you have. Some will deal and some will not and it will cost you dearly if they don't.

[GitMeMyShootinIrons]

New baby smell.....

Most smells coming from babies are not particularly pleasant. It gets worse as they get older - I remember one of mine eating some fish based baby food and then came the projectile vom from Hell. And now they're teenagers. Filthy beggars....