Hi Jon,
Thanks for replying.
Sounds like your customer is a classic example of the second of your tag
lines. i.e. "If you think education is expensive, try ignorance." - he has
apparently decided he prefers ignorance - or should that be stupidity?
I fear it's ingorance, because he told to my manager his programming is
quite modern.
Everything is written in ILERPG, that means RPGIV fixed format and the
occasional use of built-in-functions.
Compared to others it seems really modern. I just had to modify a brand new
program written around 4 weeks ago, where not even a single EVAL could be
found, not even a Z-ADD only MOVEs and MOVELs. To get the numeric current
date around 6 rows where needed and to convert a binary value (defined in a
datastructure) into a packed value around 4 rows were needed.
I took the program as it was put it in the trash and rewrote it.
... Sometimes I really ask me if I came for an other star.
Good to hear that are others outside who come from the same star. ;)
Mit freundlichen Grüßen / Best regards
Birgitta Hauser
"Shoot for the moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the stars." (Les
Brown)
"If you think education is expensive, try ignorance." (Derek Bok)
"What is worse than training your staff and losing them? Not training them
and keeping them!"
-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] Im
Auftrag von Jon Paris
Gesendet: Friday, July 11, 2008 00:51
An: rpg400-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Betreff: Re: MCH3402 - and Built-In-Function %OPEN
On 10-Jul-08, at 3:08 PM, rpg400-l-request@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
He already expressed against my manager (who unfortunately is no
programmer
but sales man):
I feel your pain!
Sounds like your customer is a classic example of the second of your
tag lines. i.e. "If you think education is expensive, try ignorance."
- he has apparently decided he prefers ignorance - or should that be
stupidity?
I'm not sure what else to suggest - but I would say that the sins
article is probably understandable by even the most non-technical
marketing guy - at least in as much as it points out that this is not
"usage as intended" and therefore he is aiding the customer to build
something IBM will not support. Even with his existing code the
customer is taking serious risks.
RCLACTGRP(*Eligible) - oh good grief - you might as well just slit
your wrists - it will be far less painful in the long run! This one
is so bad that IBM wanted to remove it altogether as an option but
were forced to keep it for compatibility reasons. But note that they
removed it from the prompts! You can only even find that it exists
deep in the help text. Why - because it is lethal - and if you use it
and (for example) an operating system function is subsequently blown
away - IBM will just tell you to go whistle if you try to raise a
support issue.
What the customer is effectively doing is driving his car the wrong
way on the Autobahn - it is not a question of _if_ he will have a
serious crash - it is a simple matter of _when_ that crash will
occur! And when it does happen you can be certain it will occur at
very high speed!!
Jon Paris
www.Partner400.com
www.SystemiDeveloper.com
midrange.com
