Posts by vcragain

IBM lifts lid on latest bid to halt mainframe skill slips

Re: Encourage z/OS and z/VM on Hercules

The truth is it has been very unfashionable to consider mainframes as worthwhile computing systems for several past decades, and because there is such an enormous amount of ancient but still-in-use code out there nobody wants to get involved because it's just not 'glamorous' - bad enough that there are online systems with nasty mainframe front ends when the guy in the next cubicle is having fun with his pretty graphical interface - but if you have to actually learn that stuff to maintain it, there is just not the willingness to 'go there'. I maintained both pc & mainframe code, but when maintenance is needed you have to act in a small company with ancient in-house systems. They generally are trying to move things to new tech but the business has to run first so that is the priority NOT the new fancy systems the programming people want !!!

I'm 84 - last wrote some code around 3 years ago but still love to dabble - I did migrate to PC's & Java partially but never left the big box - being able to write on both sides of the system world was a great advantage - they often left me alone to conjure up solutions - had great fun in my final years ! Fights over who owned what & the snobbery of the PC side was pretty funny, but they all lost their power anyway when the whole company was reshuffled in a takeover - I had just retired so it did not affect me. Moral of the story - never become too 'important' - your job can always disappear tomorrow !

Back from the dead: LockBit taunts cops, threatens to leak Trump docs

Maybe it's time to reinstate the death penalty - I can't think of a better way to get rid of useless humans ! These people are the same version of human as trump himself - just a huge need to show off & try to get the world to see how smart they are !

Crypto-crook Sam Bankman-Fried spared a second trial

Why does anyone think that CRYPTO anything originated in the first place ? obviously to HIDE what you are doing with your monetary transactions - no other reason ! THAT FACT TOLD ME RIGHT AWAY TO STAY COMPLETELY AWAY FROM IT !!! So don't be surprised if your underhand transaction is outed !

CEO arranged his own cybersecurity, with predictable results

Re: Customers are the security liability

Whenever I get an email from my 'bank' or similar suspect location i immediately delete the email & go to the actual site via my usual link & log in to see what the issue is- IF ANY - usually there isn't one !!! Solved ! NEVER click on links sent to you from any place where you know your info is stored - just go to their real page & check it out if you don't actually have your own link - look them up with a SEARCH. This business is getting far too messy to trust any email's contents IMO !

Bank's datacenter died after travelling back in time to 1970

Re: Yearly tasks....

No matter what you set up to force the checking, there is always the forgotten thing that happens because of something else - either everything is chugging along so smoothly that people get too comfortable, or too much else is going on & nobody does that one 'silly little check' that can cause the big mishap. Human nature every time - unless there's some systemic way to check - an alert if that fails etc,, then we have the 'thing that does the alert didn't work' issue - been there - regardless how hard you try there is always a potential screw up somewhere that will get you ! Checklists help, people checking other people helps too - every human makes mistakes ! Know exactly how you will recover if/when - ie backup, backup, backup !

Cat accused of wiping US Veteran Affairs server info after jumping on keyboard

A UNIVERSAL PROBLEM

The answer to why all cats seem to love keyboards is simple - you are seen to spend most of your day 'loving' that thing that sits on your desk - and NOT noticing them - so they plunk themselves down right there where you will HAVE to see them - if you seem annoyed that is a bonus - annoyance is better than ignoring them !!! Devious little buggers !!!

Five billion phones are dead in drawers – carriers want to mine them

Well I have had my current phone for about 5 years now & no intention of 'upgrading' to anything else any time soon, but I do have 2 old phones sitting in my desk, as you rightly point out, me & millions of other people ! I spent a few minutes wondering what to do with the ld one at the time I bought the new one, then did the obvious - stuck it in my desk drawer ! I guess I would be mainly worried about any information remaining on them, but happy to get rid of minew if there is a place to do that.

Canada plans brain drain of H-1B visa holders, with no-job, no-worries work permits

Re: For once, Trudeau's government has made an actual smart move.

My experience from being in the programming world for many years (retired 4 yrs) is that Indian people tend to be pretty smart but no better humans than any other group - hence theft of your ideas can be something to watch out for & ingratiating themselves into favorable positions can be an issue too. 'Determined to get ahead' is how I would categorize those I have worked with/managed, which can be good or bad depending on how they further that ambition ! Suffice to say I developed an acute 'watch out' attitude towards those in my immediate orbit - especially after having brought them 'up to speed' on certain things, only to watch attempts to shove me out of their way - lovely snaky behavior ! Unfortunately upper managers often have no idea what is really going on in their departments !

Shocks from a hairy jumper crashed a PC, but the boss wouldn't believe it

Re: "Hairy jumper"

When I was a teen my main ambition was to emigrate to Australia = had it all planned out - then I read an article about Australia's spiders - yikes - emigration plans immediately killed !

President Biden urged to appoint AI officers to regulate this shiny-shiny tech

I've always worried about the potential for a person being put in a position of power with assumed credentials that are not really either what they are claiming or are simply too out of date to warrant the position, with nobody really being on top of the knowledge tree & knowing enough to judge the situation. How to judge if you are too ignorant to know you are ignorant ? Scary !

Microsoft is busy rewriting core Windows code in memory-safe Rust

Don't feel bad - I'm 83 now & long retired but still have a deep love of all things computer, but all of these newer languages leave me scratching my head - the terminology has gone beyond my brain but still i can't resist peeking at these articles. Who would have thought in the late 1970's that this realm would become so huge nobody can keep abreast of it all ! Fascinating ! The world is moving so fast now, if civilization is still functioning in another 50 years it will be again majorly different. I'm sad I cannot be there, but i will be watching if it's possible !

Inside FTX: Jokes about misplaced funds, diabolical IT, poor oversight, and worse

Re: I wish I were shocked.

Watching my sons do battle with their tiny business & all the OSHA regulations they have to follow, it makes me wonder why anybody bothers to try & be in business in the first place - not me, I was a happy employee of a medium sized company. and had not one jot of envy at anybody earning more than me ! I rose up via hard work which was comical to me since I was enjoying myself ! I think attitude is everything in the work place, but all the regulations make life extremely difficult. I can quite understand why large corps would choose to pay fines rather than be bothered with it all - but the little people go out of business thru those fines !

Australian bank stops handling cash at the counter in some branches

Re: Outside the big cities in the US, you still need some cash

I'm a Brit living in the US - your statement pretty much sums up the whole 'Private Enterprise' mode that rules here. Basically that is 'free to screw over everybody as much as you can' ! Lovely !

Re: Opening hours

I'M 83. I worked as an 18 yr old at a small Westminster bank branch in London's Victoria Street & when manually counting the cash it was a horror story every night as nobody was allowed to go home until the cash was balanced - sometimes that meant a total recount - I remember cashiers with red faces getting really scared when things were off & a real sense of terror in case they couldn't resolve the issue. It always did get resolved eventually, but i'm not sure what would have happened if not - was it firing squad at dawn time ? I did not stay in banking for my lifetime career !

FTX audit finds $415m in crypto mysteriously vanished

Re: > How is he even permitted to use a computer and the internet

In fact it could be a way to give him just enough freedom to incriminate his cronies ! Altho of course the arrest of a very high level FBI manager type for Russian bribes does not make the public very happy about 'just trust us' on their part !

The Stonehenge of PC design, Xerox Alto, appeared 50 years ago this month

As a programmer going from mainframe to PC in this startup timeframe, it became increasingly frustrating to me that so many languages developed for use on these platforms - it became obvious after a while that there was no way to keep up with all of it - I tried for a while then got really annoyed with all the brains spouting competing code frameworks - I wanted to be competent & all of you were busy inventing things I did not have the time to learn - so disheartening, yet wonderful to see. The world is now way ahead of my retired brain, and I run into trouble now with those stupid, stupid little screens you are all running your lives with ! I have given up ! Oh well, it was a fascinating time to be alive !

Re: Xerox and foolishness

I'm 83 now, 'I was a mainframe programmer - Assembler, Cobol - discovered my first personal computer around 1980/81 & I remember all it had was Lotus123 or straight Dos. However I bought a Tandy for myself & played around with it, then finally a PC with Windows & then branched into coding on the PC. Retired some years now, but this story is still very fascinating to me having watched it all unfold & I remember competing with one of my sons who was a Mac fan & me a PC fan for which was the better machine. I still prefer the PC - he still uses a Mac. Poor old Xerox - how those guys must have wanted to kick themselves when they finally realized what they had done - but this article is the first time I had ever heard their part of the story !

Catholic clergy surveillance org 'outs gay priests'

My first question would be - who says the Bishops doing the investigations are beyond reproach themselves ? Seems to me after reading a lot of incidents regarding the sexual exploits of far too many Catholic priests that the whole structure is suspect. I would not be trusting any of them at this point as their profession appears to have been used as a system where they can easily hide, hence all of them are now suspect ! The idea that any of them would be posing as representatives of a higher order of values makes me really mad - HOW DARE YOU !!!

Windows 11 update breaks PCs that dare sport a custom UI

Well I always put my desktop back to basically a Win 98 mode - I've done that since they started getting cute with the front end (the stupid 'tiles' business) - I need everything just the way I'm used to thank you ! Stop messing around - Windows is just a software container sitting on top of Dos & those of us who coded way back when do not want to be 'contained' in your world

any more than we have to be ! The only 'improvement' I see with current Windows is the ability to allocate & buy permanent cloud storage. I have uber gobs of data on my system & that is very helpful, otherwise Windows is simply a means to organize & manage all the functions you really need to do - we do not need "Microsoft Daddy" to organize our lives !

Dish multi-day outage rolls on as ransomware fears grow

I am affected by this - my main Dish connection works normally, and tv is good, but if I try to use the internet connection to Dish via my computer - which I often do, now that method no longer works. Not life ending, just a nuisance since we get into habits of how we use everything. I wish there was a way to really punish those who think it's hilarious to interfere with the world's normal standing - sure you are a clever clogs, but also just a big nuisance to the rest of us ! Please just drop dead !

Hong Kong to crypto exchanges: get a securities broker's licence, or go home

Re: Going home imminent

The whole point of crypto in the first place was to hide money transactions so that no source or destination country could regulate or tax them. And the point of no regulating was to make illegal cash easy to move - so of course the whole system is now comprised of crooks of every flavor - and they will keep doing their thing until it is no longer possible. Regulations are a big nuisance to all of us, but they are there for a reason - why anybody is surprised that the legal side wants control of this is beyond me. It was always only a matter of time until this happened, and I always knew crypto was dodgy & would fall down eventually.

99 year old man says cryptocurrency is for idiots

I was a mainframe programmer in the early 1980's working at a big insurance company in CT - when my department got it's first PC we all got excited to try it out - after a few minutes of 'playing' with said novelty we all decided it was basically a waste of time since all it could do was Lotus 123 & we were not accountants & even DOS instructions were not something we were familiar with at the time, altho Assembler was in use. I have to laugh at how quickly those little machines took over & then the internet & boom - nothing was ever the same ! Now long retired after years later coding in PC languages, here i sit with my PC & the world all connected, my only remaining obstinacy is I refuse to use the internet on my phone - that screen is way too small for any real use & I have fat fingers ! Things change so fast at times, but crypto is not just another invention, it's a different paradigm that affects the financial structure at the root of society. Dangerous - hence needs controlling !

Re: So right

AFAIC - THAT is the modus operandi for crypto in the first place - the need to bypass the finance laws of a country ! So anybody who gets involved should expect 'the Law' to likely get interested in your reasons for doing so ! I've always thought the whole thing is a stupid trap for the ignorant, and just watched from the sidelines & felt quite smug as people started getting arrested for suspect finance operations - not surprised at all.

Learn the art of malicious compliance: doing exactly what you were asked, even when it's wrong

Re: Easier method.

The last time I decided I needed to iron something it took me ages to discover where I had parked the iron ! In thinking about it now, I realize I have no idea where it is or the ironing board for that matter !

Scammers steal $4 million in crypto during face-to-face meeting

Re: Who loves cryptocurrency?

And most people remained skeptical about the whole crypto business from day one, simply because it was obvious it would be used by crooks hiding their money transfers, and since it had so much secrecy involved how would any little guy know who to trust ? So while I had always been fascinated by the whole thing, it screamed ILLEGALITY to me !

Massive outage grounded US flights because someone accidentally deleted a file

Re: "Why did it take three hours to twig the cause"

Ah but 'efficient' managers think it's not a good idea to pay the high salaries of those who have been around forever & know those old systems back to front - so they think the fact that nothing critical has happened in years means nothing ever will so you don't need all that expensive support - until you do !

New IT boss decided to 'audit everything you guys are doing wrong'. Which went wrong

And that was always my attitude - I loved my job, had a happy time all day, was hated by some of the gang I worked around because of that, and I got the pay raises etc & they bitched & moaned - but in the end regardless of the extra time i gave the company, which I never counted as anything but trying to get the job done as well as possible for everybody's sake, I was the one who gained from my own attitude to the job ! I see nothing wrong with helping a company succeed, maybe because I have no jealousy in me & helped everybody regardless of who or what they were. Some may say 'more fool you' - I say I was appreciated & recognized as a big asset, so who gained the most ?

Native Americans urge Apache Software Foundation to ditch name

Re: Bit ridiculous

Exactly my reaction ! Time to stop being so nitpicky over use of a word - there's nothing derogatory about it !

Southwest Airlines blames IT breakdown for stranding holiday travelers

Re: Very simple explanation...former CEO Gary Kelly..the mergers and competition

If you take into account the amount of aggravation & the time getting thru all the procedural stuff at airports it is never quicker to fly anywhere unless the drive time is more than 8-10 hours or so, or an overseas flight of course with little choice ! I've been on several work trips where I seriously regretted not getting in my car to get to that meeting !

When we asked how you crashed the system we wanted an explanation not a demonstration

Re: we wanted an explanation not a demonstration

Obviously you are NOT a programmer - none of them would let you get away with such a stupid comment - solving problems within code streams is hardly robotic on the other hand remembering you should have/not pressed a particular button requires mere attention & memory !

Girls Who Code books 'banned' in some US classrooms

Re: God botherers strike again!

I do think there is a danger that 'talking' to young teens can confuse them, and for schools to decide to just talk to kids who are not asking for any 'help' is planting ideas in their heads. The problem as always is over-zealous people who think their world-view is the only one that's real. There have always been a great variety of types of humans within either gender - just because I had very little 'frilly' needs as my young female self did not mean I needed to be steered into a sex change ! I'm still at 82 not the least bit "frilly" yet never had the slightest interest in other women, have 4 lovely kids who are the joy of my life, and enjoying my divorced, learning filled life. Leave the kids alone to figure out who they are - but also do not lecture them on what they SHOULD be - you can just introduce the great variety that is the human race so they recognize there are others just iike themselves out there !

Barge off: Nautilus to bring floating datacenters to two new sites in US, France

Sounds fine - except that the people who are looking for something to destroy have a nice new target, sitting conveniently away from other stuff, so a nice torpedo can take out a giant portion of internet connectivity in one fell swoop !

Programming error created billion-dollar mistake that made the coder ... a hero?

While not having an actual example of this, as an old long-retired programmer, THAT is the thing that made me very humble many years ago - that point where your own feelings of "I am so smart" got the better of you & you forever after KNOW that you will never do that again ! Nothing like having to admit to the boss man you were the one that 'did it' ! I think that is life's biggest lesson !

Man wins court case against employer that fired him for not liking boozy, forced 'fun' culture

This problem is caused by the Extroverts in our midst who think all of life should be 'fun' - while those of us who are Introverts have 'fun' doing what we like doing, which is generally for IT people their JOB among other hobbies & pursuits ! I was a programmer for 20+ years, and had to tolerate all that 'jolly' nonsense from those who thought that getting people to 'work together' meant having them get drunk together ! I HATE, HATE, HATE fake jollity & cannot stand people who think happiness is a rip roaring party. My happiness is far more likely to be watching the trees blowing in the wind, or the smile between friends who do not need anything more than sharing a view. Such a lot of screaming hysteria to try & convince themselves they are 'happy' does not do anything but make me want to leave asap - generally 2 hours of any 'party' is all I can stomach ! I know I'm not alone as any Introvert will agree with this synopsis of "what is happiness?". To all Extroverts I am boring as heck, but my life is such a huge world of interest & knowledge & appreciation of small things it cannot be bettered !

IBM sues Micro Focus, claims it copied Big Blue mainframe software

Re: CICS is still a thing?

You forget that many hundreds of smaller companies have ancient software that they rely on to do business, wishing to upgrade does not pay for upgrades, so what works is still in use. I worked from 1990 to 2015 or so at a company that had inherited it's systems from a prior owner of itself, and had no choice but to use the ancient software, So CICS & multiple mainframe systems were 'it'. Many of them were in process of being migrated in bits & pieces to PC alternatives, but it was extremely messy. However if something works it is not in the interests of a corporation to get rid of it to satisfy the ambitions of younger IT people - the business is all that counts, as it should be ! Having a master plan to roll over to more modern concepts is the way to go, but in my experience those with the control over such things are not necessarily the people who have enough knowledge to make those choices - hence the stalemate & lack of a coherent plan. IOW 'nobody listens to me' is the problem !

Windows 11 runs on fewer than 1 in 6 PCs

Re: Typically we wait for

The problem arises every time because Microsoft thinks it is 'computer world' and what it forgets is it is only the medium upon which all the packages we WANT to use are loaded - we don't necessarily need or want Windows itself, it gets in the way ! The concept of 'Windows' is a great one, not arguing about that - those containers holding an app that allow us to keep multiple apps going while we busily roam around doing various things, make it a wonderful environment - but Gates is forever trying to make his 'thing' into 'the world', just as the google guy is doing. OK fine so you made a useful thing you are getting paid for - we don't need YOU - we just want to use what you produced & get on with other stuff ! But they can't leave it alone, have to keep trying to be 'THE CONTROLLER' !!! The first thing I did when I got my last Win 10 pc was reorganize it to look like my Win 95 desktop, so I could carry on the way i did before all the Win 10 'enhancements'. I don't like 'tiles' don't need you to tell me how I should be running my life - i'm busy - go away ! Sometimes I have a good laugh when I've got several 'cmd' windows running - the very essence of the whole point of Windows as far as I'm concerned ! All the graphics are just fancy goop to make it all 'pretty' - and that's the point of the changes - to SELL - MARKETING at it's best - or most awful !

CEO told to die in a car crash after firing engineers who had two full-time jobs

I'm long since retired, but when I took my last programming job more than 30 yrs ago, with an Israeli owned company in NYC, I vaguely remember the "Introduction to the company" session with HR being a lot about what they expected you to do - including that the hrs you work for the company belonged to THEM. they could not of course tell you what to do in your other hours, but the implication was heavy that in working for them you "belonged" to them ! I learned later that they -prior to my joining them- had a Russian lady working there who had caused big issues with strange behavior with her personal associates brought into the office in nighttime hours, so they were totally primed up in suspicion mode of all things "programmers" ! I loved working there, but learned early on that staying out of office politics was safest, and 'head down, just do your job' made life simpler ! Of course their 'working hours belong to us' policy was a joke considering basically my whole life revolved around that job in the end, but that tends to happen when you love what you do.

Former Microsoft UX boss doesn't like the Windows 11 Start menu either

Well I have Win 10 Pro on both my laptop & big desktop, but I immediately changed my display to the old Win 95 mode so that I didn't have to deal with what the idiots thought was 'improved' !!!

Unbelievably clever: Redbean 2 – a single-file web server that runs on six OSes

Re: Scary

EXACTLY - my first reaction tioo !!!

Yale finance director stole $40m in computers to resell on the sly

Re: Give back some?

You forget that what the University LOST is what counts - they were paying thru the nose for her to stash loot in her own accounts - it's irrelevant what she 'made' out of the transaction ! I think most crimes like this start out small, and when they are not caught the perpetrator simply can't help going for more & more.

C: Everyone's favourite programming language isn't a programming language

Re: A Grotesque Simulacra of C

The point of spoken language is simply to communicate, and the English language changes constantly over time - we can barely recognize the way they spoke 500 years ago, and it is evolving as we speak (:>) so to be a snob for 'grammar' is really just silly. I find I hate a lot of common talk these days but since I'm now 82, it's not my world going forward - I barely understand my grandchildren's chatter these days ! BTW what the heck is 'woke' ? Still love to think about my early coding days starting with Assembler, then Cobol, Java, C, lots of fun, and now long since retired into obscurity. I would happily go back to those long nights solving elusive problems & ignoring dinner however ! Have fun & appreciate while you can everybody - this life is very short !