Re: Today (Feb 26) IBM announcements

Clark,
  This was NOT a set of announcement for programming languages (or most 
programming tools).  There weren't new releases of IMS, CICS, or DB2. 
Even 
Language Environment was only included in the "preview" of z/OS 1.10.

I think that you (Clark) are well aware that there are some '02 Standard 
features that IBM Enterprise COBOL programmers would like (table sort, 
initialize enhancements, even EXIT enhancements) while there are others
they do 
NOT want (free form reference format that is available almost everywhere
is NOT 
popular with IBM mainframe COBOL programmers, certainly VALIDATE and
enhanced 
REPORT WRITE are questionable).

I am not at SHARE this week, but recent indications from IBM are that they
are 
getting more resources to meet existing SHARE (and other user)
requirements for 
COBOL.  If this is true, I would expect significant enhancements to COBOL
in the 
next 18 months or so.  However, who knows for sure.

P.S.  The recent V4.0 announcement did meet a couple of SHARE requirements

including ZIIP support for COBOL/XML and a separate "compiler options"
file.

-- 
Bill Klein
 wmklein <at> ix.netcom.com
"Clark F Morris" <cfmpublic@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message 
news:vlsbs35f58padvgl9kqc0borbgp2u5lgn1@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> On Tue, 26 Feb 2008 21:24:10 GMT, "William M. Klein"
> <wmklein@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
>>Probably all of you who MIGHT care already know about it, but there were

>>several
>>significant announcements by IBM today.  Therefore, I won't post links
to all 
>>of
>>them, but some that might interest some in CLC are:
>>   (I think these links will work, but they may be "individualized" for
me. 
>> Let
>>me know and I can look for other links if these don't work generally.)
>>
>>HARDWARE:
>>  IBM System z10 Enterprise Class -- The forward-thinking mainframe for
the
>>twenty-first century
>> 
>>
http://www.ibm.com/vrm/newsletter_10577_2548_62970_email_DYN_1IN/WKlein12584487
>>
>>OPERATING SYSTEM (preview)
>>  Preview: z/OS V1.10 -- Raising the bar and redefining scalability,
>>performance, availability, and economics
>> 
>>
http://www.ibm.com/vrm/newsletter_10577_2548_63032_email_DYN_1IN/WKlein12584487
>>
>>ISPF (yes, it is "well and getting enhancements")
>>  IBM ISPF Productivity Tool V5.10 enhancements deliver increased
efficiency 
>> for
>>ISPF users
>> 
>>
http://www.ibm.com/vrm/newsletter_10577_2548_63020_email_DYN_1IN/WKlein12584487
>>
>>   ***
>>
>>For a summary of today's announcements, go to:
>> 
>>
http://www.ibm.com/vrm/newsletter_10577_2548_62925_email_DYN_1IN/WKlein12584487
>
> What is striking is what announcements were not there.  There was NO
> announcement of COBOL supporting floating decimal.  There was NO
> announcement of COBOL being able to interoperate with 64 bit JAVA.
> There was NO announcement of any support for the features of the 2002
> standard.  There was only an announcement of COBOL XML support.  From
> what I can see COBOL for IBM is a cash cow that is going to go away.