Re: The joy of FORTRAN

c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> wrote:

On 2/28/25 11:42 PM, rbowman wrote:

On Fri, 28 Feb 2025 21:11:33 -0500, c186282 wrote:
 

Came across a 360 (model 20 ? the little one) in use by a parts
distributor about 20 years ago. Nowadays they're always emulated,
like with the Hercules system or better since I doubt you'll get
parts/service for yer ancient 360/370 now.

 
That must have been cute. RPI had a Model 30 in '66 and I thought that was
the bottom of the barrel.

 
  Checked. The Model 20 was extremely popular, but
  allegedly didn't do the entire 360 instruction set.

It was a 16-bit machine that used the half word binary instructions from
the 360 instruction set. It did have the decimal instructions and, I
believe the SS instructions: MVC, CLC, etc. Obviously no floating point. In
theory, I guess, you could run your /20:programs on larger models, but I
doubt many people did. The I/O was completely different, and the disks were
sectorized instead of CKD.

  WAS the cheapest system ... but cheap/good.  The
  model 30 was similar - but did do the whole
  instruction set.
 
  Don't remember if the one I saw was a 20 or 30 ...
  but it was still hummin' along and doing practical
  work. The corp likely got it 2nd-hand and found
  somebody who knew how to make it do its stuff.
 
  So, not a total surprise to see one still in use
  so much later on. Never be quick to throw away
  something that WORKS.
 
  Probably all COBOL  :-)
 

IBM got you on the maintenance. At some point it was cheaper to buy a new
370 than to keep paying maintenance on your old 360.


--
Pete