161–170 of 361 posts
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Best story I've heard is one of the old programmers commenting his COBOL code in latin . It was a different time...
I feel like that's a play for job security more than anything else.
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We have most platforms from IBM, z (Mainframe), iSeries (AS/400), p (AIX), plus about everything windows. Moving off core systems (z/i/p) isn't simple mostly because of the amount of data combined with all the custom applications. every attempt to move the apps off the z don't come to fruition because of scope and the fact it just works. the i is increasing its load to pick up from the z and getting a good dose of we…
> Moving off core systems (z/i/p) isn't simple mostly because of the amount of data combined with all the custom applications. I wonder if someone could get away with selling a z/i/p emulator, akin to Wine. (Or perhaps more appropos, Mame, since the machine architecture would differ as well.)
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all features and edge cases should have a test. if possible also have tests for all the bugs ever found in the old system. it helps if the tests are not too coupled with the code and are well documented. a test could be making an entry where deb and cred dont match. or trying to enter an extra decimal. and if the system adds two decimals corectly.
Maybe I don't give the rewriters enough credit, but in all honesty, I'd be surprised if they bothered to look that deep into the code and tests before it's already too late. Too often, there's just some handwaving and proclaiming you "don't to it like that in today's software".
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We have most platforms from IBM, z (Mainframe), iSeries (AS/400), p (AIX), plus about everything windows. Moving off core systems (z/i/p) isn't simple mostly because of the amount of data combined with all the custom applications. every attempt to move the apps off the z don't come to fruition because of scope and the fact it just works. the i is increasing its load to pick up from the z and getting a good dose of we…
> Moving off core systems (z/i/p) isn't simple mostly because of the amount of data combined with all the custom applications. I wonder if someone could get away with selling a z/i/p emulator, akin to Wine. (Or perhaps more appropos, Mame, since the machine architecture would differ as well.)
Been working on accounting systems in RPG and COBOL since ~1992. I also know C/X86ASM/Pascal/Delphi/VB/Fortran. Never bothered with C++ that much; played with Java a bit but Oracle irritates my bowels so moved away from that. As mentioned in the article it's good work; but it is also not easy work. You tend to go through cycles of being pushed out to brought back under extreme emergency at any costs to get stuff work…
Too often the old guys simply re-create the old system using the old methods in new software, and you end up with all the same problems as before.
In a perfect world, the two would work together.
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It's not unheard of. But you must understand that these are people that have a pretty decent job security in an often huge codebase that has been aquiring cruft for 30 years in language most people don't understand. I would like to be able to claim that the code is good, but some of the people writing it in the first place were not programmers. It is not strictly bad, but some parts are just mine fields. A bit relate…
Best story I've heard is one of the old programmers commenting his COBOL code in latin . It was a different time...
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I smiled at your last comment. You're clearly a charming individual :-) Out of interest, what's the solution here? With your experiences in mind, what are the banks doing wrong from a technological perspective? I get the impression banks should almost start again on the side, building a completely new bank they then (manually?) move customers over to, or just use to take in new customers whilst waiting for the previo…
French banks are actually doing that! SG/Société Générale, a brick and mortar bank that costs a hundred dollars a year, built Boursorama, an e-bank that's free and that gives you $200 if you subscribe. Advantage: SG has too many manned agencies and can't justify preemptively mass-firing them yet – they first need the customer base to dwindle. Better IT, usage of Internet techniques at the core, and drastically simpli…
Obviously, a dealing account has to hold funds and handle transfers. That's not any close to a consumer bank though.
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> COBOL programming is not very rewaeding, and at least in Sweden, most of it is slowly being moved to other languages. Which would imply that there's a demand for people who know both COBOL, and whatever's the popular migration target for such systems these days (I assume Java?).
Migration target like visual cobol (not a joke). Just look at those smiling hipsters writing cobol.net on their laptop. https://www.microfocus.com/products/visual-cobol/visual-cobo...
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They don't. That is why they need to call back the guys that retired. Any of the new hires with talent quickly discover they can double their salary by doing pretty much anything else in IT and move on. IBM and their customers want to turn the whole thing into a McDonalds style business, but the burgers keep burning and they keep having to call people to come in and rewire the microwave and unplug the toilet.
> Any of the new hires with talent quickly discover they can double their salary by doing pretty much anything else in IT and move on. Not necessary. They do not know current frameworks and tools and probably don't know the knowledge is transferable. Effectively, they need to find a company willing to train them and the one that hires by aptitude on whiteboard test only.
I've worked in the financial sector as recently as 2006. Without getting too specific, some of the financial systems I worked on underpin large sectors of the economy, across many banking chains. While Java was starting to take over these systems, thankfully the banks and regulators were hedging their bets on JEE with the knowledge that someone would eventually have to take over these systems. They were starting to t…
Anecdotal, but my friend knew VP of Information Technology at one of the big 4 banks in Canada really well. The VP told my friend to learn COBOL and if he passed the interview, they give you a blank paper where you write down your salary.