Re: "Shared" procedure division code



"Chuck Stevens" <charles.stevens@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:dcbfk4$2gbb$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
>
> "Pete Dashwood" <dashwood@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> news:3ks2bvF100lu4U1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
>> Oh Dear! I pressed a button... sorry Chuck.
>
> Well, yeah; the question is what does that button imply?
>
>> Yes, my post was intended for IBMers. In future I'll make that clear.
>
> I think it goes deeper than that. You used phrases like "urban myth",
> "reincarnate a stupid practice that was buried in the '70's" and "in
> today's
> environment this is irrelevant". Such categorizations *encourage others*
> to limit their views to the IBM environment *and* to hold all other
> environments in similar contempt.

That's just silly. I already said my comments applied to the IBM
environment. There is no question of contempt for other environments (or
even for the IBM one) and I believe you are so oversensitized on this issue
it is affecting your judgement. I am not the enemy of Unisys (or any other
company) and I have worked in most environments. I stand by the quoted
comments above, within the stated context.
>
>> And, within THAT universe my comments were general.
>
> Well, that's part of the problem. Planetary system, maybe. Galaxy,
> arguably. By definition there is but *one* universe, and the Unisys MCP
> environment is part of that universe.
>

It isn't if I choose to limit my comments to a particular environment. I
would suggest that the Unisys MCP is your WHOLE universe and you are
absolutely as quilty of what you accuse me of.

> How do such things strike me? Try this as a *reductio ad absurdum*
> example,
> tongue planted firmly in cheek:
>
> "After all, everybody who's anybody knows that there's been no excuse for
> operating in any environment in which it's inappropriate to align a
> packed
> field (at either end) on anything but an 8-bit boundary, or to declare
> such
> a field as unsigned, for at least 35 years. Machines that impose or even
> endorse such stupid practices and limitations should have been consigned
> to
> the trash heap of history and are certainly irrelevant to any
> well-informed
> professional in today's computer science environment, and any programmer
> who
> thinks such conventions have any value whatever is clearly a dinosaur ...
> "
>
I have never written anything even approaching that.

> It's not just the fact that your remarks didn't include the explicit
> caveat
> that they were limited *strictly* to a particular environment, it's the
> categorical nature of your characterizations that bothered me, in and of
> itself. We've been through this a while back with Other Folk on this
> forum,
> and I had some hope you wouldn't descend to that level of contemptuous
> categorizations, particularly when there are clear exceptions ...
>
> -Chuck Stevens
>
I do not have contempt for ANY environment. My post was strongly condemning
a practice that was based on urban myth on the sites where I encountered it.
It is personal experience. Everyone, including myself, accepted it. It
wasn't until I was sat down with someone who knew the reality that the
scales fell from my eyes.

I wouldn't like to see this practice resurging. That was the only reason I
posted.

Interestingly, no one from ICL or Honeywell or NCR or any other major
company that was around at the time has taken offence at this or considered
my post contemptuous. Not even the IBMers who know what I'm talking about.
That's because it wasn't.

It is very wrong of you to take anything I post as a personal attack or to
conclude that I am showing contempt for anybody or anything.

I don't come here to denigrate companies or environments; not even by
omission.

Think about your position.

Pete.



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