Wednesday, July 30, 2014
Sunday, July 27, 2014
One of the better Exercise Names...
Runaway Sierra Leone Ebola patient dies in ambulance
Detail - it isn't an exercise...
A Sierra Leone Ebola patient whose family sparked a nationwide hunt when they forcefully removed her from a treatment center and took her to a traditional healer, died in an ambulance on the way to hospital, a health official said.
Can't make this stuff up...
(In other cases, I've heard Chinese Herbal Medicine can help...other things...)
Frish
Saturday, July 26, 2014
Re: DFWIBMers.org: 360 JCL: More Profound Than You Ever Imagined!
I'll tell you a little about thinkenstein, and I remembered a couple of S360 Card Deck stories.
I went to school for about 21 years, eventually getting an MBA after my BA Archaeology (I'd place her on the upper amazon, quite similar!).
During my academic career, the topic of S/360 card decks came up...
FORTRAN Class I took pass/fail. I was using the batch compiler to 'debug' my deck, since it pointed out all the syntax errors...I didn't like ensuring a clean deck before submitting, not clear my programs would have worked or not! Took 3 days to get the deck back with the printout, so I could correct a few bugs, and resubmit...I dropped the class but essentially I "failed Computers".
Earlier in my career (like 3rd grade) my handwriting was so bad they had me see a shrink (in Houston).
So, I also failed handwriting.
IBM eventually used me to write about computers...
My Marketing professor when I was a first year MBA student, along with his partner (another professor), had 6000 responses from a survey (with 300 questions!) from account holders of San Diego Federal (S&L wonder where they went!) that had trillions of possible topics.
So, I got a look at the data and picked a fairly easy conclusion.
I spent 18 months, going through the MBA process, and needed the deck to run against an SPSS query I had posed, but 6000 respondents was 60,000 cards in total...it was a whole bunch of cards, so the systems guy couldn't get time to run my deck. I can't remember exactly, but I believe I finally had something he wanted, and, I needed the data run!
My Master's Thesis "Bank Market Segmentation - Age group prediction of cash using behaviors" was finally finished late June 1979, it published in 1980 and was the first San Diego State Master's Thesis submitted from a word processing program! (another long story.)
Thinkenstein grew up near LAX, graduating HS in El Segundo about 1963 or 64.
His grandfather built machine tools...his father had a garage load of projects, as he was a magician and built his own props (as a hobby!).
So, Friend Think grew up with two mechanics and a load of encouragement.
Almost graduating from Berkeley(!), he decided to become a wandering minstrel, and eventually crossed the US, went to Europe and hitchhiked all over, and then who knows when exactly, he ends up in Puerto Rico.
I believe he 'homesteaded' the top 9 acres of the mountain he lives on, via the USDA or whomever (Dept of Interior) administers it...
He built a cabin, that is now enclosed by the dome, and has lived there for close to 40 years.
First 8 years, 1/2 mile from nearest neighbor (and a SIGNIFICANT up/down steep valley terrain, unlit (when he didn't have a flashlight, things like walking home wasn't done quickly)), with no running water...
He had paved hundreds of feet of forest floor, you can walk 150 vertical feet down the mountain, about 1/4 mile via the path/zipper stairs he carved and paved in the Jungle...and there is a faucet with water you can drink, to US Standards, it's Puerto Rico (you can smell the chlorine!).
Many of those feet of cement attached to fish net were made from bags he'd schlep in from 1/2 mile away (50lb sacks of cement...and not much sand or gravel in the jungle, he did a LOT of hauling of STUFF for many many years...).
A bit about Bill:
He is naturally curious about a lot of things.
He likes finding mechanical engineering solutions best, and creates his musical instruments with that in mind.
He doesn't do well with engines, but ANYTHING ELSE he's expert
Cement work
Carpentry
Welding
Plumbing (including waste disposal and water retention, and water flow subsequent to huge downpours without eroding the neighborhood...)
Architecture
Puzzle Solving and Creating (like the LOCK he has on his house, no one would EVER be able to get in, without blowing a big hole in it...LOL
Computer Graphics
Musician
Builder of Musical Instruments
Vegetarian (plus fish)
Likes being alone
Has had various artists and con artists, who have stayed a year or more there, in the citadel.
He likes, nowadays, to bang on new percussion instruments he's built and recording the sounds.
Several years ago, the neighbor just below him on the hill sold more land to Bill, so he now has something like 25 acres on the top of the hill, it's really really cool.
Now, as to finances? I believe his mother supported his habits early on, and he inherited her money upon her death.
He did visit El Segundo to help as his father failed, so he met Mort and Sue and helped design a Frishberg Cousin's Club TeeShirt!
I think he did/does well in the stock market, I know the 2008 'correction' was quite worrisome for him, but he seemed sanguine about money this trip...
Bill LOVES TO SHARE:
For a hermit (essentially) Bill like to share.
For a clue into the extent of his nutziness see
All the best,
Frish
On Sat, Jul 26, 2014 at 4:03 PM, Lloyd Hubbard <lloydhubb01@gmail.com> wrote:
Michael,What an interesting visit. Can you give me more information on your friend, why he lives this way, what he does, who are his neighbors, how he supports himself, etc., etc.?I had one visit to a village in Central America--a side trip in the middle of a cruise up the Pacific side. The small (comfortable) cruise ship anchored off of the mouth of a small river and we zodiaced ashore, then entered a small outboard-motor powered rowboat for a trip up the river to a village set up as a trading place where native people from several surrounding villages came, with their wares, to sell to the tourists.The people were very cordial to us and we were usually surrounded by little children. One feature of the trading village was a wooden dock for unloading the tourists from the rowboat. Cruise tourists are customarily of advanced age, so one of the natives was assigned the duty of helping us from the rowboat to the dock.One would expect a fairly hefty young man for the job, but no, the designated helper was a young female--18 yrs or so--dressed tastefully in a few beads. In case I have not sent you a photo of her, it is attached. One of my cousins said, as he was helped from the rowboat--"I think she took my ear temperature".LloydOn Fri, Jul 25, 2014 at 5:48 PM, Michael (Frish) Frishberg <frishberg@gmail.com> wrote:
Lloyd, great story, thanks.Before I relate at little something, here's where I was (again, for the fourth time!) last week (just returned 2 hours ago!).If I've shared that before, enjoy it again!As far as JCL goes, I never worked with 360/370 machines, since I was a 'mini-computer' salesman.The Sys/32 and Sys/34 were my bread and butter.While they also had a simplified JCL, it wasn't like decks of cards by then (early 80's).However, it involved double slashes as the pre-fix to commands.
If you had real trouble debugging, the command that applied was //wrist (slash slash wrist)!Life is good, for a change, hope all is well with you and yours!Frish--On Fri, Jul 25, 2014 at 1:57 PM, Lloyd Hubbard <lloydhubb01@gmail.com> wrote:
Michael,
You and your Dad are the only friends that I thought would enjoy this.
Lloyd
Lloyd
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "DFWIBMers.org" <dax@rubicontechventures.com>
Date: Jul 25, 2014 9:16 AM
Subject: DFWIBMers.org: 360 JCL: More Profound Than You Ever Imagined!
To: <lloydhubb@mchsi.com>
Cc:
DFWIBMers.org: 360 JCL: More Profound Than You Ever Imagined!
360 JCL: More Profound Than You Ever Imagined!
Posted: 24 Jul 2014 03:37 PM PDT
This will be best appreciated if you remember your JCL commands. Among my experiences [from Ross Daily] is an IBM computer story which I know will amuse you and maybe will move you.
When I ran into one the early 360/50s in 1964 at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, I was hooked. At graduation, I interviewed with IBM, but they wanted sales staff in white shirts and ties and I wanted to work in a sweatshirt at geek central in White Plains. As it turned out, I went on for an MBA at Queen's University in Canada, not far from my NY State home. I used the Queen's computing centre a lot and worked nights helping undergrads wrestle with FORTRAN, COBOL and JCL. When I graduated, the centre hired me. Purely as an aside, Queen's had in 1970 what we were told was the most heavily loaded 360/50 in Canada. It was something of an experiment. We ran OS, DOS and TOS, had 1mb internal, with an additional 1mb of slow core memory. We had a resident IBM systems analyst plus two of our own. Also, I just have to mention our two IBM 1403 chain printers. What a triumph of engineering! I'm impressed to this day.
Back to the story: I ended up managing the 50′s accounting system for the centre, distributing millions of imaginary dollars to schools and faculties, and maintaining accounts on every student's and professor's allotment.
"Please Mr. Daily! I know my account is empty, but I'm almost ready for my dissertation! Just one more run; it'll only take 45 minutes!" I was a merciful accountant: "OK, I'll slip you into the batch run at 3:30 a.m. tomorrow. Not a word to any one; NOT A WORD." I had a most enjoyable assistant named Jack. He was in his 30s and had a dry and eccentric sense of humour. We still ran programs from card decks at the time, even monsters like SPSS, StatPacSocSciences. If you remember your JCL, the student's pile of data cards was preceded by a card containing the JCL statement:
sysin dd *
sys: Hey 50
in: Input coming
dd: some poor sophomore's data deck is next
*: starting NOW
Jack entered the office one day and said "sysin, dd star" in the vocal lilt you would use to say, "sit down, Mr. Jones." I was charmed by this conversational use of a JCL statement. I have never forgotten it, and it has become more and more profound to me over the years.
I was driven out of work by severe back pain at 60. Since then, I've been free to study particle physics and cosmology for my own interest. The concepts involved cannot help but redefine one's understanding of our reality. Carl Sagan is right. All of the elements excepting hydrogen are made in stars, which explode, etc., and become us. So, a few years ago, it occurred to me that regardless of one's religious beliefs, regardless of the unknowable facts of the matter, we do know that, when we die, we leave here and go 'somewhere else.' All our atoms will ultimately go back to the universe whence they came. I sent all of this with the punch line to Jack a couple of years ago, but his mind has drifted away.
So, this is just for you, JCL folks. It seems to me now, that, as I draw my last breath, I should whisper:
–Universe
–input coming
–my data deck, everything I am
–starting NOW
sysin, dd *
AND, now that I've learned "text speak," my tombstone will read:
WTF?
WTVR
LOL!
SYSIN, DD *
I hope this has meant something to you; we are the only ones who can truly understand.
So long, awesome geeks!
Ross Daily
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Frish
Friday, July 25, 2014
Advice for a friend who needs to write a Eulogy
Tell them what he meant to you.
Tell them how he helped you.
Tell them what fun, or what you learned, or whatever you did together...
Give him respect by creating new memories of him, in those that love him.
Thursday, July 10, 2014
140710 18of18
we wait for
Our turn
death
the "one"
a line
a cashier
a butcher
the right time
when we can afford it
things that are worth waiting for
sleep to return nightly
lottery results
her to return
sunrise
sunset
midnight
meteor streaks in the sky
the smiling clown
the second hand (on the clock)
then end of work day
the end of class
progress in yoga
muscles to grow via weight lifting
the new year
the weekend
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