The Whiteboard

user114359

5:01 PM

Given they were doing mainframe COBOL work it sucked, but the employer gave them plenty of perks, too, to make up for it. Like extra vacation time.

user114359

Didn't mean to delete that: I used to work with guys making USD$200k per year in one of the cheapest places to live in the USA. So in a place like NYC or SF they would be making twice that.

user114359

@GlenH7 there is something to be said for a person who gets the job done, no matter how dirty the job is.

user41796

It certainly offsets the other times when I pull a prima donna fit. :-D

user114359

Maybe it's just the military man in me talking, but I've done my fair share of crawling around in the mud -- literally and figuratively.

daOnlyBG

How would working in mainframe support effect/further your career, though? If there's such little room for innovation and it "sucks the soul out of you" (as the community wiki page said), it seems like money is really the only thing you'd get out of it

(which, I guess, isn't so bad if money is all you want)

user41796

5:05 PM

The literal bit, I can't tolerate as much anymore. The figurative bit, I can still deal with

user41796

@daOnlyBG z/OS is one of the most elegant, sophisticated, and secure operating systems I've ever seen

user41796

Those whinging about it "sucking the soul out of you" ought to consider opening their eyes up and looking at the opportunity around them

daOnlyBG

[shrug] okie

user114359

@daOnlyBG don't get into mainframes unless you can finagle a job where you only do it part-time, so you get the perks but also keep your "modern" skills sharp.

daOnlyBG

**ok

user41796

5:07 PM

Only OS I know of with non-pre-emptive threading. Which makes hunting down race conditions a hell of a lot easier.

user114359

The point is, the world is not full of smart phone apps and web apps, there is a lot of other software out there.

daOnlyBG

Right, I get that

user114359

There is a lot of money to be made outside of the app store

user41796

@Snowman Most shops are running multiple environments within their mainframe and you'll see quite a bit of the "more modern" stuff in those environments

daOnlyBG

yet the industry is still relatively uncompetitive, right?

**that specific industry

user41796

5:08 PM

@daOnlyBG Depends upon your locale and business sector

user41796

Finance and insurance use a lot of in-house mainframe apps because of security and transactional speed

daOnlyBG

THat figures

***That

user41796

There is an argument to be made about those industries not being competitive, but I don't think that's the level of nuance you were going after

daOnlyBG

@GlenH7 Yeah, I'm just asking in general terms

user41796

back end supply chains used to use a lot of mainframe, but have downsized in some cases due to overhead costs with mainframes and getting "good enough" transactional speed on other platforms

user114359

5:10 PM

@GlenH7 right, the place I worked with those mainframe guys we had a mainframe in the back-end but a web app up front where I worked

daOnlyBG

I work in the pharmaceutical industry; I'm not entirely certain if my company still uses them

user114359

@GlenH7 I have done work in inventory management and logistics: Oracle is huge there now.

user114359

Everyone things of Oracle as the database, but they do so much more than that.

user41796

@daOnlyBG Some, yes, but mostly on the claims side. R&D side, not so much. Supply chain, quite possibly

user41796

@Snowman Oracle has a really good sales team. :-)

daOnlyBG

5:12 PM

Haha, the guy 2 cubes down from me works in the supply chain division

I should ask

user114359

@GlenH7 That too. And if people think Microsoft are bad with their vendor lock-in, Oracle are ten times worse

daOnlyBG

So most mainframe systems are written in COBOL and C?

user114359

COBOL, JCL

user41796

@daOnlyBG Not necessarily

user41796

Depends upon the age of the program

user114359

5:14 PM

Modern mainframes can do pretty much anything a microcomputer can do, such as Java and .NET

daOnlyBG

and probably the program's make

user114359

But realistically, the majority of mainframe programs are COBOL and JCL

user41796

@Snowman and sometimes they do it better. :-)

user114359

@GlenH7 Most people's minds would be blown... hot swap a CPU? What?

user41796

I kinda miss working on an as/400 (iSeries).

daOnlyBG

5:15 PM

so with sufficient C#/.NET and COBOL skills, one should be able to find a position somewhere in the country for mainframe maintenance/development, right?

user41796

@Snowman Sure! Why not when the quest is for 4 9's or more

user41796

@daOnlyBG potentially

user114359

I read an article a few years ago about all the "revolutionary" tech coming to desktop and server microcomputers, and how it mostly originated on mainframes

Stack Exchange

Beyond Coding Recap: Helping Emerging Developers Launch Careers

Jean Anstett on October 6, 2015

This summer, Stack Overflow together with a host of NYC-based tech companies, created Beyond Coding, a 10 week program for emerging developers and designers. We sought to guide students through the finer points of professional 'soft' skills in order to help lose lacking experience gain a foothold in the technical job market.

daOnlyBG

5:30 PM

Alright everyone, my lunch break is over; thanks again for helping me out

see ya!

user41796

yw

user114359

adios

durron597

ooh, i'm in page one of HNQ

yay questions that get 6 answers that are all mostly the same. i knew it was too broad

user41796

Congrats?

durron597

@GlenH7 Thank you?

user41796

5:39 PM

free spam flags

durron597

@GlenH7 that would get declined on SO.

NAA would get helpful.

But, I'll trust your judgement

user41796

Thank the gods we're not SO

user114359

I can't flag anymore

user41796

... looking at the page, it is entirely marketing material and sys nothing about how AOT actually works. — MichaelT 1 hour ago

user114359

Despite my recent ones all being helpful, there are a few VLQ that moderators declined

user114359

5:41 PM

I blame gnat for this. I don't know where I read it, but he advocated VLQ flags for garbage answers

user41796

It's spam since it's there to promote a service without statement of affiliation and doesn't even answer the question

user41796

@Snowman I got hit with a few NAAs being declined during the big Late Answer review change

durron597

@Snowman I never flag anything VLQ anymore

user41796

So I have a nastygram on my flag dialog to the effect of "go review your old flags"

user41796

> Dear System, 3 declined flags against thousands of helpful flags should tell you something...

user114359

5:43 PM

If I were a mod I'd take out the trash, whether it is technically appropriate or not. And I'd be up front about it during elections, so there would be no surprises.

durron597

77

Q: The Very Low Quality flag is broken

NAA is for answers that don't make any attempt to answer the question: asdfjhaklsefuh I like cows Thanks! Did you find the solution? Sometimes link-only answers, but not all moderators agree VLQ is for posts that are: Very low quality (no, that's downvote). Have severe formatting or content...

@GlenH7 It only looks at the most recent week.

I have the warning on SO right now because I had 14 flags pending, all of which were custom flags

during and after those 14 flags, I had literally thousands of helpful flags

Then, I stopped flagging because I got busy and tired of it

user41796

@Snowman The problem there is it requires you to be able to make a determination about the technical accuracy of the answer. Given the breadth of a site's scope, that's too much to expect from mods

durron597

Then, some of those old 14 flags were declined.

user41796

@durron597 I hear the last guy that raised thousands of flags like that was given a diamond so they wouldn't have to deal with his flagging anymore. :-)

user114359

@GlenH7 I am not talking about honest answers that are inaccurate, but literal garbage that I flagged that my children could identify as crap and the flags got declined.

durron597

5:48 PM

I got close to 3000 helpful flags from Aug 1 to Sept 22 o.O

user41796

Yeah, those ought to be nuked

durron597

@Snowman link?

user41796

But the way SO mods handle things is different than how most other sites are handled

user41796

The sheer volume of SO forces that difference

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