Are AS prorammers outsourced or local?

Local, all work physically in our office in California. All work full time 100% for us.

Thats good. Sounds like they need more training.

Sounds like you are an armchair quarterback who doesn't have a clue.

No need to be snippy about it. I have been programming computers for over40 years. I have earned my armchair.

Punch cards and wiring boards?

Shows your age. I started in the early 60s and cards were pretty much phased out by then.

What kind of computer did you work on?

40 years would make it 1964? 40 years of programming? Let's say you started at 25?

I'm not trying to give you a hard time. But, if what you are saying is true, you would be a very unusual person. Very few people would have gone thru what you have gone thru and still be programming. No disrespect - just want to find out.

Come on - are you a "card jock".

Larry,

Also, what "language"? Some COBOL? Some Fortran? Some Basic? Maybe Assembler?

Larry,

Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper?

All the IBM main frames from 360 to 3080s using assembler mostly. Wintel PCs (assembler and OOP) since they came out in the 80s. Some midframes in RPG and Assembler. The applications included Manufacturing, Banking, Insurance, Market Research, Weather forecasting, Accounting. I retired in 1980 but still keep a hand by helping develop websites for local schools and government groups.

I retired in 1999, not 1980.

Larry, that is very interesting. I used government computers back 28 years ago and thought they were the antiques of antiques!
Lol, I KNOW I am!

quote:

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Originally posted by larry_the_legend:
... OOP) since they came out in the 80s ... Some midframes in RPG and Assembler.

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Now Larry - don't tease me. "OOP"? "RPG"? What IBM platform?

Larry,

IBM - I've Been Moved? Itsy Bitsy Machines?

Wingtips?   SE's?   CE's?   Marketing Reps?

OOP = Object Oriented Programming, usual in C or one of its cousins. The natural language for AS400s was RPG, not like the RPG used for mainframes in the 60s and 70s. I had to learn Pascal and Ada for government contracts.

Hi larry

Always wanted to get into the software end of the business, but spent my career as a hardware slug.

I've dabbled with assembly, but never REALLY figured out what I was doing. Had some good results with Basic jumping to assembly subroutines though. Got into something called Mobol (a twisted and raped version of Cobol) and had some minor success, but that was only good on a single product line of a single company.

Larry,

My hat is off to you. Not many programmers have/could adapt to so many changes. I understand why you use that ID. So, if you'll accept this from me, here's your armchair:

And, in case someone closes down the previous picture:

Ive also spent 10 years as an IBM AS/400 RPG programmer. Also been wondering about the number of reported bugs lately. However, AS has been working ok for me so far. Last night had a snipe placed and padded it with a 40 sec lead time,(being sunday night) looks like there was only a 5 sec delay. Didnt win though, outbid, still looking for that first sniped win, lol. Oh, and RPG stands for Report Program Generator though it does much more than that.

happy sniping

I find it a bit uncanny ( not disbelieving anyone) that we have so many here that have worked in this field ! As must attract you!

Here's something else - AS/400 and AS. And of course, everyone knows the meaning of "400". Hmmmmm!

RPG - Rocket Propelled Grenade.

Rick said:

quote:

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Hmmmmm!

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LOL

happy sniping

majipoor

And happy sniping to you.


Was the "LOL" for the RPG or AS or something else?

quote:

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Originally posted by Puppy Raiser:
Hi larry

Always wanted to get into the software end of the business, but spent my career as a hardware slug.

I've dabbled with assembly, but never REALLY figured out what I was doing. Had some good results with Basic jumping to assembly subroutines though. Got into something called Mobol (a twisted and raped version of Cobol) and had some minor success, but that was only good on a single product line of a single company.

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I've always been partial to FORTH. Very strange language where you basically create your own keywords. You can have a program where, "take the beer from the refrigerator and drink it" can be a fully functional program! ... or, for those south of the equator .... "put the empty vegemite jar back in the cupboard and never admit to eating it all"!

I've been a tried and true BASIC kinda guy since the beginning ... throw some z80/8080 assembler in for fun too.

RE: AS and their intermittent bugs ... they really are few and generally fixed (by what I read in these forums) rather quickly. I'm wondering though if they could use a few beta testers to run test-auctions on their development system? Things like the recent bid-group snafu would probably have been caught ... but then on the other hand, some changes need to be implemented rapidly because eBay loves to tweak their system and break other peoplese software

Mother Mary Says, 'HONESTLY! you're just ruint!'

As a software consultant, you see lots of strange things - had a client that was still uusing punch cards for it's accounting system in 1998!

We were trying to install a 3D CAD system, needless to say they had a long way to go culturally.

The government is the hardest to pry away from punch cards... Makes inventory soooo easy. One card, one item.

My first college computer programing class used punch cards. They were kinda fun!...Until the first time you DROPPED your card deck!!!

Jabbergah                                                    

Anyone but me know what a 'bit bucket' is?

quote:
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Was the "LOL" for the RPG or AS or something else?
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was for the RPG = rocket propelled grenade

happy sniping

haha, so was mine... the computer operator used to keep a spare deck of cards hidden behind the counter where you had your jobs submitted to the main frame. Bastard would wait until you were rushing in your last edit on a 3,500 card program at 11:59pm (computer center closed at midnight)the day before its due, take your deck, put it behind the counter, take out his deck of fakes, juggle it around and then drop it on the floor. Then he'd stand there and look sheepish and say 'oops' as you went from red to purple trying to control your impulses to strangle him. Then he'd laugh and laugh, grrrrrrr, lol.

happy sniping

Maji,

After the initial panic & blood pressure spike, you have to admit the computer op.'s joke was pretty good! LOL!

Jabbergah                                                    

lol, yes I do have to admit that. Kind of thing I'd want to do if I had a boring comp op job!

happy sniping

My first real job (don't count busboy at a country club) was a third shift computer operator. All I did all night was hang tapes. We still had card decks as well - but the guys that ran those jobs didn't have much of a sense of humor....

In the 60s the person high on the food list was a "Systems Analyst" and there was true story about one of those guys.

It seems that our company had too many punch cards, I mean like warehouses full of them. We had just replaced our EAM equipment with computers running a TOS (tape Operating System) and really needed to get rid of all those cards. We tried burning them but they stuck together and using gasoline was expensive and the Chicago Fire Department discouraged using solvents. So we gave it to our Systems Analyst.

He studied the problem for 10 days and came back with 12 books of charts and instructions. They boiled down to this: Go card-to-tape with the cards and
.
..
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......
.......

Burn the Tapes.

Had a friend in college who taught himself Fortran using the book I had for the course I was taking. He later transferred to a school in the West in his home state. He wrote a program that could bomb out the school's computer which he would put in the in box whenever he got ticked off at the shcool. Later when on to start a software company and did quite well before selling it several years ago.
I spent many a boring night working as a grant-in-aid running the punch cards through the reader, and the finished print-outs and cards back in the bins for students. Old GE Computer actually had wires connecting all the transistors. Looked like colored spaghetti.

Lol, drummer...he should have given you a cut of the profit!!

I should have been so lucky!

Lol! You might look him up and remind him! (just kidding!)