Author Topic: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2  (Read 12542 times)

Martin Iturbide

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The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« on: February 20, 2018, 04:35:05 pm »
This is an interesting video from IBM.

https://youtu.be/wJyiHsfJLEI

It is a nice story about a kid who bought a mainframe and installed it on his basement... WHAT??? He now works at IBM.
(joke)I suppose he has to work there to pay the MLC (Monthly license charge) (/joke).

There is his full presentation called "I just bought an IBM z890, Now what?" (I still need to check that video completely)

But it is a nice story, getting mainframe information and how to use it has always been a question to me. Maybe someday I will experience that.

If you check the video on 1:55 you will see OS/2 Warp Server for e-Business Booting. And that is some other thing that I also wonder, what was the relationship between OS/2 Warp and the Mainframe? I basically known (or think that I know) that for some control or functions of the mainframe an OS/2 machine will came embedded to make it easy to administrate it. But I never saw that in life or knew if there were any specific software used on OS/2 to administrate a mainframe.

Has anybody used OS/2 to administrate the mainframe? Am I completely wrong on my appreciation?

Anyways it is a nice story.

Regards


« Last Edit: February 20, 2018, 04:38:23 pm by Martin Iturbide »
Martin Iturbide
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Martin Iturbide

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #1 on: February 20, 2018, 10:00:43 pm »
There is his full presentation called "I just bought an IBM z890, Now what?" (I still need to check that video completely)

Hi

I just completed to watch his full presentation, it is very nice presentation for someone that is complete noob on the Mainframe. There are some screenshots of OS/2 on 13:18,  and the audience recognized OS/2 very fast :)  It seem that it shows you for 15 minutes the license agreement, then there is an screenshot of app called "System Power Progress".

I liked his talk. For someone like me that never used a mainframe it was fun.

Regards

Martin Iturbide
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Olafur Gunnlaugsson

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #2 on: February 20, 2018, 11:15:04 pm »
And that is some other thing that I also wonder, what was the relationship between OS/2 Warp and the Mainframe?

There is a PC running OS/2 embedded into the mainframes that lives outside the VM, controls the boot (although they can supposedly boot without it) and also handles certain legacy communications protocols that are mostly used these days for PC to PC terminal services, configuration and administration, but it may be used for some diagnostics work as well. It is still there there in most modern mainframes or at the least the bigger ones, it was there in a 2016 model that I saw delivered via Unisys. It is simply there since the comm software layer/server was written in the 80's and updated in the mid 90's is rock solid on OS/2, an NT version did exist as well but never had the polish that the OS/2 version had, cheaper to maintain it than to start from scratch. There may be some other old custom software on there as well.

Martin Iturbide

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #3 on: February 20, 2018, 11:28:07 pm »
Thanks for the feedback Olafur.

If by any chance you can find some screenshots of the administration software, please post it here.

Regards
Martin Iturbide
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Doug Clark

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #4 on: March 09, 2018, 03:09:00 pm »
On the home page of WWW.IBM.COM there is a picture of Conner Krukosky and an article about him buying the mainframe and now working at IBM. They call it a "passion project."

https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/passion-projects/careers-mainframe/?lnk=ushpv18l1&lnk2=learn

Martin Iturbide

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #5 on: December 28, 2018, 04:58:31 pm »
Hi.

I'm reviving this old topic since Arca Noae released "S/390 Backup Facility based on ArcaOS".
https://www.arcanoae.com/shop/s-390-backup-facility/

Sadly, I don't understand the solution since I have never used a mainframe. But I think it is good for AN to find a corporate niche when they can offer a solution for some mainframes.

Is this an ArcaOS image with some special OS/2 backup software to extract a backup for the Mainframe S/390?
Does it has some thing else? like the Support Element (SE) software?

I also always wanted to know if there is a way to download "Support Element (SE) for OS/2" (or at least to know which is the latest version) just to try to run it on OS/2 and see if it can do something without a mainframe, to at least take some screenshots.

Regards
« Last Edit: December 28, 2018, 05:30:05 pm by Martin Iturbide »
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Remy

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #6 on: January 03, 2019, 03:35:12 pm »
Hi Martin,

Prefer search for HMC/SE or HMC (add OS/2 due newest HMC is linux based system)
Here you can find some screenshots
ftp://public.dhe.ibm.com/la/documents/br/events/itso2010/zenterprise-hcm-itsoww2010.pdf

Cheers/2
Remy 

ps: If you would like install and see how a s/390 works, you can install an image under a windows or linux system => http://www.hercules-390.eu/
« Last Edit: January 03, 2019, 03:39:49 pm by Remy »

Dave Yeo

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #7 on: January 04, 2019, 05:08:49 am »
it would probably build and run fine on OS/2. Biggest problem would be no network support as it needs a tap driver which I don't think we have.

Martin Iturbide

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #8 on: January 04, 2019, 03:07:14 pm »
Hi

I would like to see if we can get the installer of the OS/2 software that works to control de mainframe ( "Support Element (SE)"  - Anything else?) to see if it can be installed on OS/2 (ArcaOS) and try to know which was the last version of the software available for OS/2 and take some screenshots.

Thanks for the info Remy.

Regards
Martin Iturbide
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Remy

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #9 on: January 05, 2019, 12:27:47 am »
Hi

I would like to see if we can get the installer of the OS/2 software that works to control de mainframe ( "Support Element (SE)"  - Anything else?) to see if it can be installed on OS/2 (ArcaOS) and try to know which was the last version of the software available for OS/2 and take some screenshots.

Thanks for the info Remy.

Regards

You can not get the software, it is part of IBM HW (HMC)

More info: https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/TI0002C/p8hai/p8hai_fixeshmcupgrades_enh.htm
« Last Edit: January 05, 2019, 12:31:05 am by Remy »

Bogdan

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #10 on: January 08, 2019, 04:51:58 pm »
it would probably build and run fine on OS/2. Biggest problem would be no network support as it needs a tap driver which I don't think we have.
Do you speak about Hercules here? How can it be a problem? Most of the operating systems you can run legally under Hercules or as a guest under VM/370 don't have LAN support. There are different branches of the Hercules code, some of them provide emulation of control units. But I don't think that most users want to manage all this ACF/VTAM stuff. So it should be more simple to use a 2540 or tape for data exchange.

Dave Yeo

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #11 on: January 08, 2019, 06:13:51 pm »
I know very little about Hercules, just looked at the build requirements and the tap driver jumped out as a missing requirement.

Bogdan

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Re: The Mainframe Kid - and OS/2
« Reply #12 on: January 10, 2019, 04:13:12 pm »
I know very little about Hercules, just looked at the build requirements and the tap driver jumped out as a missing requirement.
Which branch of hercules? The only usage I can imagine is with the OSA which would mean native linux/390. Although in this case z/VM would handle the load much cheaper nowadays.

The only "tap" I could find is from inside "tape". https://github.com/SDL-Hercules-390/hyperion