Re: Is there a answer for this? -- MIDRANGE-L

There are two problems & we have had them for decades.

1. People go home in the evening & they leave their work stations signed on 
in the middle of programs.  We need to kick them off to do backup.  Sometimes 
they are in middle of some update program.

2. People have multiple sessions.  They get interrupted.  They loose track of 
the fact they have other sessions active.  It is quitting time.  They sign 
off the session in front of them.  They do not check status of other 
sessions.  They turn off their device.  A variation on this is people 
connected via PC with a PC printer emulating 400 printer.  Correct end 
procedure is to STOP the printer, then bye the PC.  No one does it.  I see no 
point in trying to train them - I just ignore the 400 error messages.

Now we do have sessions ending abnormally because of a PC problem, but the 
vast majority of our abnormal terminations are due to people who cannot learn 
how to properly end their work station when they are done for the day & my 
main concern is not the spike in poor performance for the good workers who 
are anxious to check their work before they leave, but more in the damage to 
data bases when a program in middle of updating our files is trashed because 
the work station was powered off in the middle of it.

Our solutions, to try to reduce rate of incidents.

When people ask why their data is messed up, I am sure to include this 
scenario in my list of possibilities, which means that some supervisors cut 
down on it among their people for about a week.

Friday afternoon about 1 hour before day end there is a scheduled message to 
all users currently signed on, reminding them that there is no need to leave 
their equipment consuming electricity all weekend & please check all sessions 
to sign-off screen before power off.  This message is periodically rephrased .

Management seems to be interested in the electricity consumption topic, 
particularly after we came in after a 4 day weekend to find half the PCs & 
twinax devices in the company powered up.  The question has come up if there 
is some way to remotely pull the plug at day end ... I do not think this is 
doable on an individual work station basis, but it might be a reverse 
application of a LAP (local area power).  I personally believe that the power 
draw of the system printer is perhaps where we might next kill the power on 
weekends.

Several decades ago when this sort of problem started happening on hardware 
before the AS/400 & before S/38 or S/36 had been invented, I started 
suggesting to the manufacturers of the display stations that some time it 
might be nice if they could include a NUMBER OF SESSIONS ACTIVE icon that is 
easy for users to comprehend.  Then we could try to train them that they need 
to take that digit down to zero before powering off their display station.  
Such a number would also remind them that there are other sessions other than 
the one currently shown.

I believe that wherever the configuration data is stored would be a starting 
point for making this doable.

MacWheel99@aol.com (Alister Wm Macintyre) (Al Mac)
AS/400 Data Manager & Programmer for BPCS 405 CD Rel-02 mixed mode (twinax 
interactive & batch) @ http://www.cen-elec.com Central Industries of 
Indiana--->Quality manufacturer of wire harnesses and electrical 
sub-assemblies - fax # 812-424-6838

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