The Y2K problem - again (was: Fwd: Linux on a small memory PC)

[Andreas Kohlbach]

Signed 8 bit for years before 1900? Makes no sense. Unsigned 8 bit
gets you pretty far. That doesn't sound like anything that would pass a
design review.
I worked with computers from 1964 until a few years ago.
I can't recall anyone abusing dates to save space.

Isn't this exactly what the Y2K problem was all about? Storing the
last two digits as characters seems just as arbitrary as using a
single 8bit binary value. True with just one more byte, overflow
isn't a problem, but if everyone used just two more bytes and kept
all characters in a year, Y2K wouldn't have been a problem.

The user enters that 2 digit year. If you want to store a 4 digit year,
some piece of software is going to have to figure out whether to add
'19' or '20'.

If the software allows 20XX... If not (and it's older) it might only
store two digits: possible Y2K impact.

When you want to enter a credit card expiration year, no one has the
patience to enter 20xx for the next 100 years.

I see that in web form pulldown menus are used giving the current and may
be 10 next years (like 2030) to just click.

I did a lot of Y2K remediation. Rarely was the correct solution to ask
the user to enter a 4 digit year. I can't recall that ever happening.

Or it was static. So the 19 was fixed (and not saved) and the user added
the rest. So when 1985 he just typed "85" and the machine would likely
also only store "85".

I move this into the folklore group, knowing many of you read there too.

[Charlie Gibbs]

[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

For aged accounts receivables, we needed half a dozen cost fields.
To accomodate this, we punched the packed decimal fields into the
cards without unpacking them. The decks were noticeably flimsier
than a normal deck, thanks to all those 12-0-1-8-9 punches.

Clearly a case of the employer being cheap because he didn't use
larger cards.

:-)

There were always those Remington-Rand 90-column cards...

Maybe that's why IBM came up with 96-column cards on the
System/3. They wouldn't do it to be incompatible, would
they? Nah...

Fun fact: 96-column cards are exactly as long as 80-column cards
are wide. That probably simplified things for factories that
made both..

[25B.Z959]

Post by Charlie Gibbs
[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)

Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....

There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Post by Charlie Gibbs
For aged accounts receivables, we needed half a dozen cost fields.
To accomodate this, we punched the packed decimal fields into the
cards without unpacking them. The decks were noticeably flimsier
than a normal deck, thanks to all those 12-0-1-8-9 punches.

Clearly a case of the employer being cheap because he didn't use
larger cards.

:-)
There were always those Remington-Rand 90-column cards...
Maybe that's why IBM came up with 96-column cards on the
System/3. They wouldn't do it to be incompatible, would
they? Nah...
Fun fact: 96-column cards are exactly as long as 80-column cards
are wide. That probably simplified things for factories that
made both..

Surprised they didn't make them one or two millimeters
larger, just to ensure incompatibility :-)

In any case, punch-cards ruled for a long time and you
DID have to squeeze a lot to get yer record to fit on
one of the things. Lots of corners cut, assumptions
made. Tomorrow ? They're paying me for TODAY.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)

Actually, I'm working with brand-new records. But there are still
many cases where for one reason or another, it takes several physical
records to represent one logical record.

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

We must be careful not to sell those guys with the skinny ties short.
Some of them were pretty smart. Newer is not necessarily better -
and wise people won't break a working system for fashion's sake.

[25B.Z959]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)

Actually, I'm working with brand-new records. But there are still
many cases where for one reason or another, it takes several physical
records to represent one logical record.

Hmmm ... that big ? ... including photographs/video or the
like ? The traditional solution is to just point to an
external file in yer db record. That has plusses and
minuses though.

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

We must be careful not to sell those guys with the skinny ties short.
Some of them were pretty smart. Newer is not necessarily better -
and wise people won't break a working system for fashion's sake.

They were VERY smart ... built the foundations of what we
all use today. Well-organized too. Sometimes lacking in
'innovation'/'imagination' however ... there are niches
for people like Jobs and I think we gained more on the
hardware level from mere GAMERS than anybody else - their
numbers funded hardware that's proven to be very useful
now for "AI", physical sims and such.

But yes, wise people won't break a working system. I've
seen what happens when un-wise people, eager to follow
the latest fads and buzzwords, get involved.

If you want to see how it all goes bad - just read "Dilbert".

A lot of that old institutional software though, it's
REALLY a case of "We can't afford"/"We don't DARE" -
accounting/scheduling stuff - where "broken" means
You're Dead. That's why "Wally" keeps his job :-)

Oooh ! "Robot Apocalypse" on the tube ! One of my
new favorite "B" flix :-)

[Peter Flass]

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

[Peter Flass]

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

[Lew Pitcher]

[snip]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Lew Pitcher
[snip]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

[David W. Hodgins]

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The strangest trick I encountered was a COBOL program, where the header
for a report was redefined, so the letter C in a character field was
redefined for use as constant with the value +1. That and a few other
characters with similar usage.

All done to keep the executable size under some limit for a mid 1960's system.

I encountered that in the 1980's when I was tasked with debugging why another
persons minor changes caused the program to fail to produce correct results in
testing.

Regards, Dave Hodgins

[Dan Espen]

Post by David W. Hodgins

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The strangest trick I encountered was a COBOL program, where the header
for a report was redefined, so the letter C in a character field was
redefined for use as constant with the value +1. That and a few other
characters with similar usage.
All done to keep the executable size under some limit for a mid 1960's system.
I encountered that in the 1980's when I was tasked with debugging why another
persons minor changes caused the program to fail to produce correct results in
testing.

I have yet to see an optimizer optimize the literal pool with that
trick. I don't see why.

Why do literals of 'DATE' and 'UPDATE' take 10 bytes when only 6 are needed.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by David W. Hodgins

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The strangest trick I encountered was a COBOL program, where the header
for a report was redefined, so the letter C in a character field was
redefined for use as constant with the value +1. That and a few other
characters with similar usage.
All done to keep the executable size under some limit for a mid 1960's system.
I encountered that in the 1980's when I was tasked with debugging why another
persons minor changes caused the program to fail to produce correct results in
testing.

I have yet to see an optimizer optimize the literal pool with that
trick. I don't see why.
Why do literals of 'DATE' and 'UPDATE' take 10 bytes when only 6 are needed.

Interesting, I don’t do that either, although I think I’ll optimize when
the first characters are the same. Maybe it’s more trouble than it’s worth
to scan the entire literal pool for matches, and, if course if DATE is
encountered first, you’d have to do a lot of rearranging.

These days, of course, we’re awash in memory and it’s not worth doing a lot
of work to save a few bytes; not like the old days.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Peter Flass
These days, of course, we’re awash in memory and it’s not worth doing
a lot of work to save a few bytes; not like the old days.

In _The Mythical Man-Month_, Fred Brooks describes the decision to save
100 bytes by not having the date routine handle leap years.

[Dan Espen]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by David W. Hodgins

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The strangest trick I encountered was a COBOL program, where the header
for a report was redefined, so the letter C in a character field was
redefined for use as constant with the value +1. That and a few other
characters with similar usage.
All done to keep the executable size under some limit for a mid 1960's system.
I encountered that in the 1980's when I was tasked with debugging why another
persons minor changes caused the program to fail to produce correct results in
testing.

I have yet to see an optimizer optimize the literal pool with that
trick. I don't see why.
Why do literals of 'DATE' and 'UPDATE' take 10 bytes when only 6 are needed.

Interesting, I don’t do that either, although I think I’ll optimize when
the first characters are the same. Maybe it’s more trouble than it’s worth
to scan the entire literal pool for matches, and, if course if DATE is
encountered first, you’d have to do a lot of rearranging.

Here's a first try:

Sort largest stuff first.
Then from the back, look from the front to find targets.
When you find a target at a higher address stop.
Remove the gaps at the end.

Post by Peter Flass
These days, of course, we’re awash in memory and it’s not worth doing a lot
of work to save a few bytes; not like the old days.

Yeah but an optimizer is supposed to save space and a smaller literal
pool is good for the cache.

[Richard Kettlewell]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by David W. Hodgins

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The strangest trick I encountered was a COBOL program, where the header
for a report was redefined, so the letter C in a character field was
redefined for use as constant with the value +1. That and a few other
characters with similar usage.
All done to keep the executable size under some limit for a mid 1960's system.
I encountered that in the 1980's when I was tasked with debugging why another
persons minor changes caused the program to fail to produce correct results in
testing.

I have yet to see an optimizer optimize the literal pool with that
trick. I don't see why.

GCC and Clang both do it.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by David W. Hodgins

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The strangest trick I encountered was a COBOL program, where the header
for a report was redefined, so the letter C in a character field was
redefined for use as constant with the value +1. That and a few other
characters with similar usage.

I wrote an assembly language subroutine that I called from the COBOL
program that produced pay cheques for dozens of customers (each on
a unique form, of course). The subroutine found the printer's DDname
in the COBOL program and changed it, so I could have it run cheques
for all customers in a single run without defining a ridiculous number
of printer files. (I still needed a line in the JCL for each one, though.)

[Peter Flass]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by David W. Hodgins

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The strangest trick I encountered was a COBOL program, where the header
for a report was redefined, so the letter C in a character field was
redefined for use as constant with the value +1. That and a few other
characters with similar usage.

I wrote an assembly language subroutine that I called from the COBOL
program that produced pay cheques for dozens of customers (each on
a unique form, of course). The subroutine found the printer's DDname
in the COBOL program and changed it, so I could have it run cheques
for all customers in a single run without defining a ridiculous number
of printer files. (I still needed a line in the JCL for each one, though.)

Lots of games. I did something similar for PL/I to read all members of a
PDS. i read the directory and then modified the member name in the JFCB for
each. The SHARE TAPECOPY program scanned the TIOT to determine how many
copies to make.

[Dan Espen]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by David W. Hodgins

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The strangest trick I encountered was a COBOL program, where the header
for a report was redefined, so the letter C in a character field was
redefined for use as constant with the value +1. That and a few other
characters with similar usage.

I wrote an assembly language subroutine that I called from the COBOL
program that produced pay cheques for dozens of customers (each on
a unique form, of course). The subroutine found the printer's DDname
in the COBOL program and changed it, so I could have it run cheques
for all customers in a single run without defining a ridiculous number
of printer files. (I still needed a line in the JCL for each one, though.)

Current mainframe COBOL will let you call dynalloc.

[Dan Espen]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Lew Pitcher
[snip]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

I did a full screen editor in COBOL. It was pretty neat and the code
was good.

The worst COBOL programs were the 10K+ line monsters.

A lot of early COBOL was written from flowcharts full of GOTOs with
little or no structure. Even though the language statements were simple
you still had a mess.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Lew Pitcher
[snip]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

I did a full screen editor in COBOL. It was pretty neat and the code
was good.
The worst COBOL programs were the 10K+ line monsters.
A lot of early COBOL was written from flowcharts full of GOTOs with
little or no structure. Even though the language statements were simple
you still had a mess.

One of the best things to happen in programming is that (at least some)
programmers learned how to write clean, straightforward, well-documented
code. I’ve looked at some early FORTRAN programs, too, and they’re the
same. Control jumps all over the place, and no one ever, ever, wrote a
comment.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Peter Flass
One of the best things to happen in programming is that (at least some)
programmers learned how to write clean, straightforward, well-documented
code. I’ve looked at some early FORTRAN programs, too, and they’re the
same. Control jumps all over the place, and no one ever, ever, wrote a
comment.

Mind you, at the height of the Structured Programming craze, there were
fanatics who would write programs whose control jumped all over the
place - into and out of a ridiculous number of subroutines whose length
varied from 1 to 10 lines. There wasn't a single GOTO, but remember
that a subroutine call is just a GOTO paired with a "come from".
It's still spaghetti code, just with double strands.

[Ahem A Rivet's Shot]

On Wed, 20 Jul 2022 00:27:35 GMT

Post by Charlie Gibbs
Mind you, at the height of the Structured Programming craze, there were
fanatics who would write programs whose control jumped all over the
place - into and out of a ridiculous number of subroutines whose length
varied from 1 to 10 lines. There wasn't a single GOTO, but remember
that a subroutine call is just a GOTO paired with a "come from".
It's still spaghetti code, just with double strands.

This approach has reached it's zenith in some "Enterprise Java"
houses where it isn't tiny subroutines but classes that proliferate madly.

Firstly everything is an Enterprise Java Bean - which means that it
is an object with set and get functions for all member variables (that
*must* be used) and some conventional methods. Secondly everything has to
follow a "design pattern" and wear this on it's sleeve in the form of
paragraph long class names. For anything like a data type there will be
data access, transfer and model objects (at least) and there will be
interface classes, facade classes and at least one implementation class
for everything. Thirdly all methods must be short, mindlessly simple and
independently testable - complexity *must* live in the object structure not
the method code. Finally logging, tracking, performance measuring, etc
hooks are routinely levered into the code using aspect weaving.

Most programmers use IDEs that are basically code generators with
GUIs so they never have to think about all the boilerplate.

Debugging can be frustrating.

Oh yes testing - automated unit testing is required usually with
very high line and branch coverage. Sounds great right ? But the simplicity
of the routines and the requirement that tests be true unit tests with every
external dependency mocked means that the tests are usually tightly coupled
to the code and have to be changed for every code change which rather
defeats the point.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Post by Peter Flass
remember
that a subroutine call is just a GOTO paired with a "come from".
It's still spaghetti code, just with double strands.

LOL!

It's just another example of 'rules are for the guidance of wise ,men,
and the obedience of idiots'

The goal was clear understandable program flow. Sometimes an 'Go
immediately to jail, do not collect $200' is in fact easier to understand

[Peter Flass]

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
remember
that a subroutine call is just a GOTO paired with a "come from".
It's still spaghetti code, just with double strands.

LOL!
It's just another example of 'rules are for the guidance of wise ,men,
and the obedience of idiots'
The goal was clear understandable program flow. Sometimes an 'Go
immediately to jail, do not collect $200' is in fact easier to understand

I usually try to write structured code, but sometimes a GOTO is the best
way to get out of someplace several levels deep.

[Dan Espen]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Lew Pitcher
[snip]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

I did a full screen editor in COBOL. It was pretty neat and the code
was good.
The worst COBOL programs were the 10K+ line monsters.
A lot of early COBOL was written from flowcharts full of GOTOs with
little or no structure. Even though the language statements were simple
you still had a mess.

One of the best things to happen in programming is that (at least some)
programmers learned how to write clean, straightforward, well-documented
code. I’ve looked at some early FORTRAN programs, too, and they’re the
same. Control jumps all over the place, and no one ever, ever, wrote a
comment.

Yep, why would they? The flowchart was the documentation.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass
One of the best things to happen in programming is that (at least some)
programmers learned how to write clean, straightforward, well-documented
code. I’ve looked at some early FORTRAN programs, too, and they’re the
same. Control jumps all over the place, and no one ever, ever, wrote a
comment.

Yep, why would they? The flowchart was the documentation.

Who needs a flow chart? "My {program|language} is so readable
that you don't need comments."

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Dan Espen
The worst COBOL programs were the 10K+ line monsters.

I took a look at one of those once. The listings took up almost
a box of paper, spread across dozens of modules. I would have
loved to have gotten my hands on the thing for a few days, but
I had to content myself with changing all the subscripts from
COMP-3 (packed decimal) to COMP-4 (binary), which knocked 30%
off its execution time.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Dan Espen
The worst COBOL programs were the 10K+ line monsters.

I took a look at one of those once. The listings took up almost
a box of paper, spread across dozens of modules. I would have
loved to have gotten my hands on the thing for a few days, but
I had to content myself with changing all the subscripts from
COMP-3 (packed decimal) to COMP-4 (binary), which knocked 30%
off its execution time.

A few simple things might give 75% of the possible improvement.

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Lew Pitcher

Post by Peter Flass
How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things


A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

The disk compression utility on Burroughs Medium Systems mainframes
(called SQUASH) was written in COBOL68. Granted, the compiler was
extended to support inline assembler...

[D.J.]

On Tue, 19 Jul 2022 12:53:19 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Lew Pitcher
[snip]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

My senior year at university I had two classes; one a compiler i VAX
PASCAL and an assembler in VAX PASCAL.

Oh the sounds of joy from the computer room. Well, there were yells.
--
Jim

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Lew Pitcher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher
TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

BTDTGTS (been there, done that, got the scars)

I once wrote a COBOL program that built and parsed terminal control
sequences. And this was before STRING and UNSTRING.

Post by Peter Flass
I think I remember reading that someone once coded a compiler in COBOL.

A friend of mine wrote an 8080 cross-assembler in COBOL.
It ran rings around the Univac-issued cross-assembler -
which was written in FORTRAN.

[Dan Espen]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Lew Pitcher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher
TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

BTDTGTS (been there, done that, got the scars)
I once wrote a COBOL program that built and parsed terminal control
sequences. And this was before STRING and UNSTRING.

You can do wonders with OCCURS DEPENDING ON, pretty much any kind of
string processing you want.

[Anne & Lynn Wheeler]

Post by Lew Pitcher
A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

around turn of the century was brought into look at performance of 450K
Cobol statement application that ran on 40+ max configured IBM
mainframes (@$30M, >$1B, number needed to finish batch settlement in
overnight window). They had large group responsible for the performance
care & feeding, but got somewhat myopically focused.

I used some other analysis tools from the IBM science center in the
early 70s and found 14% improvement.

There was another performance consultant that was brought in and found a
different 7% improvement. In the early 70s, there was a CMS\APL-based
analytical system model done at the science center ... which was made
available on the world-wide, branch office, sales & marketing support
online HONE systems as the "Performance Predictor"; branch people could
enter customer's configuration and workload profiles and ask "what-if"
questions about changes in configuration and/or workload. During the IBM
troubles in the early 90s and lots of stuff was being unloaded, the
consultant managed to obtain the rights to a descendant of the
"Performance Predictor", ran it through an APL->C language converter and
was using in for performance consulting business (not just large IBM
mainframes, but other vendors also).

a few past archived a.f.c. posts mentioning the 450k cobol statement app
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2006u.html#50 Where can you get a Minor in Mainframe?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2007u.html#21 Distributed Computing
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2008c.html#24 Job ad for z/OS systems programmer trainee
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2008d.html#73 Price of CPU seconds
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2008l.html#81 Intel: an expensive many-core future is ahead of us
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2009d.html#5 Why do IBMers think disks are 'Direct Access'?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2009e.html#76 Architectural Diversity
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2009f.html#55 Cobol hits 50 and keeps counting
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2017k.html#57 When did the home computer die?
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2018d.html#2 Has Microsoft commuted suicide
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2018f.html#13 IBM today
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2019e.html#155 Book on monopoly (IBM)

reference to IBM having one of the largest corporate losses in US
history and was being reorganized into 13 "baby blues" in preparation to
breaking up the company gone behind paywall, but mostly lives free at
wayback machine.
http://web.archive.org/web/20101120231857/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,977353,00.html
may also work
http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,977353-1,00.html

[Peter Flass]

Post by Anne & Lynn Wheeler

Post by Lew Pitcher
A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

around turn of the century was brought into look at performance of 450K
Cobol statement application that ran on 40+ max configured IBM
overnight window). They had large group responsible for the performance
care & feeding, but got somewhat myopically focused.
I used some other analysis tools from the IBM science center in the
early 70s and found 14% improvement.
There was another performance consultant that was brought in and found a
different 7% improvement.

I’m not a performance guru, but it seems like only 15-20% improvement in
old code that’s probably been beat up for years would indicate the code was
fairly decent to begin with. I would expect that, properly written - no
USAGE IS DISPLAY for computational fields, etc. - COBOL would be a pretty
efficient language. C used to be lean and mean, too, but (IMO) a lot of
cruft has been added to GCC. COBOL would have to be an order of magnitude
faster than any object-oriented stuff, but efficiency has never been a top
goal for OO languages, far behind ease of coding and maintenance.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Post by Peter Flass
but efficiency has never been a top
goal for OO languages, far behind ease of coding and maintenance.

You might say that, I couldn't possibly comment.

But I will.
In many cases OO is a round hole into which far too many square
procedural pegs are forced.

This makes it very slow to code, and very hard to maintain/.

The beauty of C for me is that you could write it like assembler for
speed, or you could use its ability to limit lexical scope to write what
were essentially objects.
The ability to create efficient local storage using te stack, was
superb. Of course the downside of overwriting buffers and thesreturn
address with ugly unchecked code was not great.
But if you want to use a chainsaw, dont fuck around., Follow the basic rules

Todays OO is like to days suburban streets. Slow suspension smashing
fuel guzzling dangerous nightmares designed to force people to adopt
what good drivers do anyway. Take care not to kill other people.

So that complete idiots can now write code, And, I am afraid, it shows.
The quality of public websites is execrable.,: I cant recount the number
of minutes I have wasted on the phone with a person struggling at the
other end to make the 'new computer system' find my records, by
searching on one of up to ten different screens...only to find that
whilst the code to add new customers has been finely optimised, the code
to remove on does not even exist.

I think that writing a flow chart or a state diagram is a discipline
that programmers might well learn, instead of creation a dictionary of
objects..

[Peter Flass]

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but efficiency has never been a top
goal for OO languages, far behind ease of coding and maintenance.

You might say that, I couldn't possibly comment.
But I will.
In many cases OO is a round hole into which far too many square
procedural pegs are forced.
This makes it very slow to code, and very hard to maintain/.
The beauty of C for me is that you could write it like assembler for
speed, or you could use its ability to limit lexical scope to write what
were essentially objects.
The ability to create efficient local storage using te stack, was
superb. Of course the downside of overwriting buffers and thesreturn
address with ugly unchecked code was not great.
But if you want to use a chainsaw, dont fuck around., Follow the basic rules
Todays OO is like to days suburban streets. Slow suspension smashing
fuel guzzling dangerous nightmares designed to force people to adopt
what good drivers do anyway. Take care not to kill other people.
So that complete idiots can now write code, And, I am afraid, it shows.
The quality of public websites is execrable.,: I cant recount the number
of minutes I have wasted on the phone with a person struggling at the
other end to make the 'new computer system' find my records, by
searching on one of up to ten different screens...only to find that
whilst the code to add new customers has been finely optimised, the code
to remove on does not even exist.
I think that writing a flow chart or a state diagram is a discipline
that programmers might well learn, instead of creation a dictionary of
objects..

I occasionally still do both.

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Anne & Lynn Wheeler

Post by Lew Pitcher
A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

around turn of the century was brought into look at performance of 450K
Cobol statement application that ran on 40+ max configured IBM
overnight window). They had large group responsible for the performance
care & feeding, but got somewhat myopically focused.
I used some other analysis tools from the IBM science center in the
early 70s and found 14% improvement.
There was another performance consultant that was brought in and found a
different 7% improvement.

I’m not a performance guru, but it seems like only 15-20% improvement in
old code that’s probably been beat up for years would indicate the code was
fairly decent to begin with.

Or it would indicate that the code was so poorly written that it would
take a complete rewrite to make it perform better.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Scott Lurndal

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Anne & Lynn Wheeler

Post by Lew Pitcher
A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

around turn of the century was brought into look at performance of 450K
Cobol statement application that ran on 40+ max configured IBM
overnight window). They had large group responsible for the performance
care & feeding, but got somewhat myopically focused.
I used some other analysis tools from the IBM science center in the
early 70s and found 14% improvement.
There was another performance consultant that was brought in and found a
different 7% improvement.

I’m not a performance guru, but it seems like only 15-20% improvement in
old code that’s probably been beat up for years would indicate the code was
fairly decent to begin with.

Or it would indicate that the code was so poorly written that it would
take a complete rewrite to make it perform better.

There’s always that, too.

[25B.Z959]

Post by Lew Pitcher
[snip]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

Got any of it on a floppy or print-out anywhere ? I'd
love to see how to do client/server only using COBOL.

Yea, you could do it in BASIC too ... with lots of
DATA statements. I remember converting a Fortran
pgm to IBMPC BASIC, but had to work that newfangled
8087 the hard way using DATA. 8087s are weird. Yuk !

COBOL was deliberately made to do "business stuff" in a
super-wordy fashion that was SUPPOSED to be "self documenting".
Maybe the only language requiring more text than Java :-)

[Lew Pitcher]

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Lew Pitcher
[snip]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

A long time ago, I worked on many COBOL applications, including a
client (PC) / server (MVS) communications application. I've seen
things that I cannot unsee, coded things that I cannot uncode.

Got any of it on a floppy or print-out anywhere ? I'd
love to see how to do client/server only using COBOL.

Both client and server used the same COBOL codebase, but with
different compilers and operating environments.

The client was coded in Microfocus "Visual Object (VISOC)" COBOL
and ran on Windows NT 3 and Windows NT 4.1, using a TCP/IP to SNA
(terminal communications) connection.

The server was coded in IBM COBOL and ran under IMS DC on an MVS
system, using an SNA terminal LU as it's communications endpoint.

As this was an in-house "inner platform" project (3 tier client/server
architecture, circa 1990), I did not keep personal copies of any
of the code. Suffice it to say that my first question to the architect,
my first day on that project, was "Why COBOL?" The answer was "Because
that's what the coders know."

Post by 25B.Z959
Yea, you could do it in BASIC too ... with lots of
DATA statements. I remember converting a Fortran
pgm to IBMPC BASIC, but had to work that newfangled
8087 the hard way using DATA. 8087s are weird. Yuk !
COBOL was deliberately made to do "business stuff" in a
super-wordy fashion that was SUPPOSED to be "self documenting".

Agreed. That was the defining component of COBOL, and perhaps it's
saving grace.

Post by 25B.Z959
Maybe the only language requiring more text than Java :-)

Those of us who coded COBOL for a living kept a boilerplate^W
template program handy, just so we didn't have to fill in all that
language /just/ to get a program started.

[Kerr-Mudd, John]

On Wed, 20 Jul 2022 02:50:57 -0000 (UTC)
Lew Pitcher <***@digitalfreehold.ca> wrote:
[]

Post by Lew Pitcher
Those of us who coded COBOL for a living kept a boilerplate^W
template program handy, just so we didn't have to fill in all that
language /just/ to get a program started.

Ah that old chestnut: "I'll start coding, you go and find out what the user
wants".

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Wed, 20 Jul 2022 02:50:57 -0000 (UTC)
[]

Post by Lew Pitcher
Those of us who coded COBOL for a living kept a boilerplate^W
template program handy, just so we didn't have to fill in all that
language /just/ to get a program started.

Ah that old chestnut: "I'll start coding, you go and find out what the user
wants".

Been there, done that - although I was on the receiving end of:
"You start coding, I'll find out what the user wants."

[Kerr-Mudd, John]

On Wed, 20 Jul 2022 17:16:37 GMT

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Wed, 20 Jul 2022 02:50:57 -0000 (UTC)
[]

Post by Lew Pitcher
Those of us who coded COBOL for a living kept a boilerplate^W
template program handy, just so we didn't have to fill in all that
language /just/ to get a program started.

Ah that old chestnut: "I'll start coding, you go and find out what the user
wants".

"You start coding, I'll find out what the user wants."

I may have mis-remembered; your phrasing sounds better.

[Lew Pitcher]

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Wed, 20 Jul 2022 17:16:37 GMT

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Wed, 20 Jul 2022 02:50:57 -0000 (UTC)
[]

Post by Lew Pitcher
Those of us who coded COBOL for a living kept a boilerplate^W
template program handy, just so we didn't have to fill in all that
language /just/ to get a program started.

Ah that old chestnut: "I'll start coding, you go and find out what the user
wants".

"You start coding, I'll find out what the user wants."

I may have mis-remembered; your phrasing sounds better.

Shops differ. We had a very involved user community, and no lack
of requirements and specifications. Our task, as architects,
designers, and developers, was to keep up with our users. It didn't
hurt that we had both regulatory and fiduciary requirements and
deadlines to satisfy as well. Such is life in a big bank.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Lew Pitcher

Post by 25B.Z959
Got any of it on a floppy or print-out anywhere ? I'd
love to see how to do client/server only using COBOL.

<snip>

Post by Lew Pitcher
As this was an in-house "inner platform" project (3 tier client/server
architecture, circa 1990), I did not keep personal copies of any
of the code.

Indeed, that wasn't common practice in those days. Besides, before
personal computers, what would you keep it on that you could read
at home? Mind you, if I look hard I might be able to find a COBOL
program I wrote to convert a report to PostScript, which we sent
to an Apple Laserwriter we had lying around.

Post by Lew Pitcher
Suffice it to say that my first question to the architect,
my first day on that project, was "Why COBOL?" The answer was "Because
that's what the coders know."

The only reason everyone uses COBOL is that everyone uses COBOL.
-- me

Post by Lew Pitcher

Post by 25B.Z959
COBOL was deliberately made to do "business stuff" in a
super-wordy fashion that was SUPPOSED to be "self documenting".

Agreed. That was the defining component of COBOL, and perhaps it's
saving grace.

One day, our inside sales manager, Al Tannock (a bit of a wit -
in his own mind, at least), walked in and said to our new DP manager
(more than a bit of a wit in reality): "Say something in COBOL."

Without hesitation our guy shot back:

EXAMINE ROOM REPLACING ALL TANNOCKS WITH SPACES.

Post by Lew Pitcher

Post by 25B.Z959
Maybe the only language requiring more text than Java :-)

Those of us who coded COBOL for a living kept a boilerplate^W
template program handy, just so we didn't have to fill in all that
language /just/ to get a program started.

Heck, I still do that today in C.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

COBOL IME was generally written by teams of coders after the analysts
had written the specification, to strict coding standards which if not
adhered to got you the sack.

[Peter Flass]

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

TBH you cant do many tricks in COBOL and the whole thrust of the bloody
language is 'do it by the book, and write the book as documentation, as
well'

How much would you like to bet? Yes, the language encourages
straightforward programming, but I’ve seen things…

COBOL IME was generally written by teams of coders after the analysts
had written the specification, to strict coding standards which if not
adhered to got you the sack.

Maybe in some places, but that wasn’t the rule as I’ve seen it. Most shops
had programmer/analysts where one individual was assigned to work with the
customers, design the system, and do the programming, testing, conversion,
etc. I worked one place that had a separate analyst group, and that
engendered a lot of griping among the programmers. Fortunately by that time
I was a sysprog and didn’t have to deal with that foolishness.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by The Natural Philosopher
COBOL IME was generally written by teams of coders after the analysts
had written the specification, to strict coding standards which if not
adhered to got you the sack.

I once wrote some programs in a shop where I was given specs that were
so detailed that I could probably have written a compiler for them.
Unfortunately, I identified a number of cases that the specs didn't cover.
When I asked about this, I was given the answer which is now at the top
of my list of Famous Last Words: "Oh, don't worry about that - it'll
never happen." Since I had enough experience by this time to know that
"never" is usually about six months, I refused to proceed until all
cases were accounted for. Beware of nasal demons!

As for coding standards, this shop's standards were so inefficient
that it would take a job half an hour just to schedule, let alone run.
I threw their precious standards into the trash can and wrote the system
my way, which scheduled and ran in 30 seconds. When I was met with
the predictable howls of anguish, I told them that I wanted to get things
tested in a reasonable amount of time, and if they really wanted their
standards that badly they could change it back when I was done.
I doubt they ever did.

[J. Clarke]

On Tue, 19 Jul 2022 10:48:20 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Peter Flass

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

Maybe these are better than translators I have seen, but old ones produced
unreadable code, and they might well miss some litte tricks that the old
guys put in, and so leave time-bombs in the translated program. Much more
expensive, but a lot better, is to extract the specs from the existing
code, and there are re-engineering programs that can probably do a lot of
that work, and then rewrite in the new language using programmers skilled
in that language.

Good luck with that. Figuring out the spec from the code can be an
immense undertaking.

[J. Clarke]

Post by 25B.Z959

Post by Charlie Gibbs
[Cross-posted to alt.folklore.computers]

Fortunately, few are so cheap to be using 2-digit dates
anymore. Not so in the past - they just assumed 19xx. Saved a
little space, easier calx.

There you go, true to form. Now people use 2 digit dates because
they are cheap.

You are neglecting Computers Past ..... low speed, low
capacity. You simplified calx, you squeezed-down the data anywhere
you could. I know, I had to do it.

Me too. My first job was in an all-card shop. To squeeze things onto
an 80-column card, we stored dates in 5 columns as ddmmy. That's
right, we only kept the last digit of the year. I started there in
1970, and one of my first assignments was to go through all report
programs and change the '6' they inserted in front of the year to '7'.

In an all card shop having more than 1 card for a logical record is a
problem. Not insurmountable but difficult. I've heard the one digit
year story in that context but never had to deal with it.

We used two cards for customer name data, but they didn't have dates
in them, just long names. You're right, having more than one card
for a logical record is a pain in the ass. I use the present tense
because I'm still faced with such files today.

Yep - the past IS present ... old records never die, they
just become more inconvenient. :-)
Amazing how many institutions STILL run COBOL apps writ
during the 60s by the guys with skinny ties. They work
very well, they're too expensive to re-do, so ....
There's probably a COBOL->C++ or JAVA translator out
there somewhere ... but money's so tight these days
and so many of those legacy apps are so super-critical
that they just can't/won't.

And now some poor schmuck in India has to deal with it all.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Andreas Kohlbach

Signed 8 bit for years before 1900? Makes no sense. Unsigned 8 bit
gets you pretty far. That doesn't sound like anything that would pass a
design review.
I worked with computers from 1964 until a few years ago.
I can't recall anyone abusing dates to save space.

Isn't this exactly what the Y2K problem was all about? Storing the
last two digits as characters seems just as arbitrary as using a
single 8bit binary value. True with just one more byte, overflow
isn't a problem, but if everyone used just two more bytes and kept
all characters in a year, Y2K wouldn't have been a problem.

The user enters that 2 digit year. If you want to store a 4 digit year,
some piece of software is going to have to figure out whether to add
'19' or '20'.

If the software allows 20XX... If not (and it's older) it might only
store two digits: possible Y2K impact.

When you want to enter a credit card expiration year, no one has the
patience to enter 20xx for the next 100 years.

I see that in web form pulldown menus are used giving the current and may
be 10 next years (like 2030) to just click.

I did a lot of Y2K remediation. Rarely was the correct solution to ask
the user to enter a 4 digit year. I can't recall that ever happening.

Or it was static. So the 19 was fixed (and not saved) and the user added
the rest. So when 1985 he just typed "85" and the machine would likely
also only store "85".
I move this into the folklore group, knowing many of you read there too.

What’s often done is to pick a base year older than the oldest date you
have to deal with. For example, if your company was started in 1970 you
can’t have order dates prior to that, so you can interpret order dates ‘00’
to ‘69’ as 2000 to 2069, and anything ‘70’ and above as 1970. This is only
a temporary kludge, but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

[Dan Espen]

Post by Peter Flass
What’s often done is to pick a base year older than the oldest date you
have to deal with. For example, if your company was started in 1970 you
can’t have order dates prior to that, so you can interpret order dates ‘00’
to ‘69’ as 2000 to 2069, and anything ‘70’ and above as 1970. This is only
a temporary kludge, but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

That's the fixed window solution.
A sliding window uses the current date to pick a base year.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass
What’s often done is to pick a base year older than the oldest date you
have to deal with. For example, if your company was started in 1970 you
can’t have order dates prior to that, so you can interpret order dates ‘00’
to ‘69’ as 2000 to 2069, and anything ‘70’ and above as 1970. This is only
a temporary kludge, but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

That's the fixed window solution.
A sliding window uses the current date to pick a base year.

Depends on the application, but in either case an application can still be
using a two-digit date and still be sort-of y2k compliant.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

[Dan Espen]

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock, but maybe it will be enough to
to keep us going until fusion comes on line. It’s no longer 30 years away,
now they’re talking about the next decade. One sure sign is that big
investors are starting to put money in.

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Scott Lurndal

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

<quote>
One of the big challenges here is that wind and solar power plants have a
much lower "capacity factor" than plants that run on fuel. A fuel-based
plant can run around the clock (with breaks for maintenance), while wind
and solar plants produce energy only when the wind is blowing or sun is
shining. Although a nuclear plant and a wind farm might have the same
"nameplate capacity" of 1 gigawatt, you'd actually need three or four wind
farms that size to produce the same number of MWh as the nuclear plant.
(EIA info on US capacity factors here; nuclear is highest, producing around
90 percent of the time, while solar PV is lowest, at around 20 percent.)
</quote>

https://www.vox.com/2015/6/9/8748081/us-100-percent-renewable-energy

[Dan Espen]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Scott Lurndal

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

<quote>
One of the big challenges here is that wind and solar power plants have a
much lower "capacity factor" than plants that run on fuel. A fuel-based
plant can run around the clock (with breaks for maintenance), while wind
and solar plants produce energy only when the wind is blowing or sun is
shining. Although a nuclear plant and a wind farm might have the same
"nameplate capacity" of 1 gigawatt, you'd actually need three or four wind
farms that size to produce the same number of MWh as the nuclear plant.
(EIA info on US capacity factors here; nuclear is highest, producing around
90 percent of the time, while solar PV is lowest, at around 20 percent.)
</quote>
https://www.vox.com/2015/6/9/8748081/us-100-percent-renewable-energy

Who builds wind or solar plants?
What the hell is the author trying to say?

Sure solar takes a lot of space. When the panels create a roof over a
parking area, they are a good use of that space. I don't see how the
space used is relevant.

I'm not 100% against nuclear, but if we can't dispose of the waste we
need to make sure the company creating the waste plans to contain that
waste for the next 100,000 years.

[Vir Campestris]

<snip>

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass
<quote>
One of the big challenges here is that wind and solar power plants have a
much lower "capacity factor" than plants that run on fuel. A fuel-based
plant can run around the clock (with breaks for maintenance), while wind
and solar plants produce energy only when the wind is blowing or sun is
shining. Although a nuclear plant and a wind farm might have the same
"nameplate capacity" of 1 gigawatt, you'd actually need three or four wind
farms that size to produce the same number of MWh as the nuclear plant.
(EIA info on US capacity factors here; nuclear is highest, producing around
90 percent of the time, while solar PV is lowest, at around 20 percent.)
</quote>
https://www.vox.com/2015/6/9/8748081/us-100-percent-renewable-energy

Who builds wind or solar plants?
What the hell is the author trying to say?
Sure solar takes a lot of space. When the panels create a roof over a
parking area, they are a good use of that space. I don't see how the
space used is relevant.
I'm not 100% against nuclear, but if we can't dispose of the waste we
need to make sure the company creating the waste plans to contain that
waste for the next 100,000 years.

The nuclear waste that will be around for 100,000 years isn't really
dangerous. Less so than a sunny day.

Some of the stuff that comes out of a fission plant is really hot - and
has a short half life. Store it for a few years, and it becomes harmless.

It's the small part that's in between that's the problem.

The other side - there's a solar farm down the road. It stops producing
every night, along with every other one on the continent. Where it's hot
enough to need aircon* the solar is a good match. Not anywhere else.

There's a windfarm on the next hill. It's often parked. That's what
killed the sailing ship - wind isn't reliable. There are occasions when
the whole UK has **** all wind.

So we need grid scale storage. I don't see such a solution.

Or we burn fossil fuels. We know where that's going.

Or we burn uranium. That isn't going to run out any time soon, it's
really common - you can even get it from seawater.

Fusion might be our saviour. Not much hot stuff left over. But I won't
hold my breath.

Andy

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Vir Campestris

Post by Dan Espen
I'm not 100% against nuclear, but if we can't dispose of the waste we
need to make sure the company creating the waste plans to contain that
waste for the next 100,000 years.

The nuclear waste that will be around for 100,000 years isn't really
dangerous. Less so than a sunny day.
Some of the stuff that comes out of a fission plant is really hot - and
has a short half life. Store it for a few years, and it becomes harmless.
It's the small part that's in between that's the problem.

There is also the chemical toxicity of most of the waste, independent
of its radioactivity levels. But sequestration should be straightforward.

Post by Vir Campestris
The other side - there's a solar farm down the road. It stops producing
every night, along with every other one on the continent. Where it's hot
enough to need aircon* the solar is a good match. Not anywhere else.

It doesn't _need_ to be a good match. Regardless of air conditioning
or not, it still reduces the use of other forms of fuel.

[Ahem A Rivet's Shot]

On Mon, 18 Jul 2022 21:56:22 +0100

Post by Vir Campestris
So we need grid scale storage. I don't see such a solution.

There are two varieties (vanadium and iron) of flow battery in
commercial grid scale use today (as in there are companies making a living
selling them to grid operators). The ferric chloride based ones look
particularly promising to me with their conservative 20K cycle rating. As
far as I can tell they're both selling big batteries as fast as they can
make them.

Flow batteries have arbitrarily large capacity (tanks of
electrolyte) and zero self discharge when idle. The tricky bit is the
electrodes and the membrane which tend to have all sorts of exotic failure
modes and side reactions. Finding solutions to these is a hot research
topic that's generating PHD theses by the tonne - so far two solutions have
gone commercial that I know of, both are into their second generation of
products.

Which is just as well because AFAICT we need grid scale storage for
*anything* other than burning fossil fuels or a fair approximation of them.

[Robin Vowels]

Post by Vir Campestris
The nuclear waste that will be around for 100,000 years isn't really
dangerous. Less so than a sunny day.
Some of the stuff that comes out of a fission plant is really hot - and
has a short half life. Store it for a few years, and it becomes harmless.
It's the small part that's in between that's the problem.
The other side - there's a solar farm down the road. It stops producing
every night, along with every other one on the continent.

The solar-thermal power station can run 24 hours a day.

Post by Vir Campestris
Where it's hot
enough to need aircon* the solar is a good match. Not anywhere else.
There's a windfarm on the next hill. It's often parked. That's what
killed the sailing ship - wind isn't reliable. There are occasions when
the whole UK has **** all wind.
So we need grid scale storage. I don't see such a solution.
Or we burn fossil fuels. We know where that's going.
Or we burn uranium. That isn't going to run out any time soon, it's
really common - you can even get it from seawater.
Fusion might be our saviour. Not much hot stuff left over. But I won't
hold my breath.
--
* Yes, aircon would be nice today. A record high temperature is forecast
for tomorrow, and it's likely CO2. But the first driver for that is
increasing population, and I don't have a solution for that one either.

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass
https://www.vox.com/2015/6/9/8748081/us-100-percent-renewable-energy

Who builds wind or solar plants?
What the hell is the author trying to say?
Sure solar takes a lot of space. When the panels create a roof over a
parking area, they are a good use of that space. I don't see how the
space used is relevant.

Time to bring Dr. Murphy back into the conversation (a bit dated now):

https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/09/got-storage-how-hard-can-it-be/
https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/02/the-alternative-energy-matrix/

His textbook has up to date treatments of both (and it's open source).

https://escholarship.org/uc/energy_ambitions

Post by Dan Espen
I'm not 100% against nuclear, but if we can't dispose of the waste we
need to make sure the company creating the waste plans to contain that
waste for the next 100,000 years.

There are alternatives, including breeders, to deal with the waste.

Then there is the thorium fuel cycle, which has somewhat more benign
daughter products.

That's all in the future, anyway, given the current lead times. Unless
the small portables get traction.

https://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-cycle/nuclear-power-reactors/small-nuclear-power-reactors.aspx
https://www.energy.gov/ne/advanced-small-modular-reactors-smrs

Some are the size of a ISO shipping container.

https://www.global.toshiba/ww/products-solutions/nuclearenergy/research/safety-reactor.html

[Ahem A Rivet's Shot]

On Mon, 18 Jul 2022 16:17:52 -0400

Post by Dan Espen
Who builds wind or solar plants?

A lot of people do, quite near me there are still the signs of what
appears to have been a successful protest against a planned 240 acre solar
plant.

One of the reasons wind farms are more popular than solar
installations is that the land can still be used for other purposes with a
wind farm whereas once you've covered a few hundred acres with panels you
can't do anything else with it. Sure there are plenty of acres of rooftops
they could go on - but those acres have very many owners.

Post by Dan Espen
What the hell is the author trying to say?
Sure solar takes a lot of space. When the panels create a roof over a
parking area, they are a good use of that space. I don't see how the
space used is relevant.

This sort of thing is neat and an effective use of space, there
should be a lot more of it for sure. But it doesn't add up to enough acres
of panels.

The real issue with intermittent and uncontrollable supplies like
solar and wind is the need for a *lot* of storage capacity. It looks like
this may, in principle, be a solved problem but it still has to be built
and installed.

Post by Dan Espen
I'm not 100% against nuclear, but if we can't dispose of the waste we
need to make sure the company creating the waste plans to contain that
waste for the next 100,000 years.

Build the active stuff into RTGs and don't worry too much about the
rest.

We need lots of batteries with nuclear as well since they are slow
to ramp up and down and are best left running at a steady level.

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Mon, 18 Jul 2022 16:17:52 -0400

Post by Dan Espen
Who builds wind or solar plants?

One of the reasons wind farms are more popular than solar
installations is that the land can still be used for other purposes with a
wind farm whereas once you've covered a few hundred acres with panels you
can't do anything else with it. Sure there are plenty of acres of rooftops
they could go on - but those acres have very many owners.

https://www.npr.org/2021/11/14/1054942590/solar-energy-colorado-garden-farm-land
https://www.wired.com/story/growing-crops-under-solar-panels-now-theres-a-bright-idea/
https://www.wired.com/story/why-covering-canals-with-solar-panels-is-a-power-move/

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Scott Lurndal

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

<quote>
One of the big challenges here is that wind and solar power plants have a
much lower "capacity factor" than plants that run on fuel. A fuel-based
plant can run around the clock (with breaks for maintenance), while wind
and solar plants produce energy only when the wind is blowing or sun is
shining. Although a nuclear plant and a wind farm might have the same
"nameplate capacity" of 1 gigawatt, you'd actually need three or four wind
farms that size to produce the same number of MWh as the nuclear plant.
(EIA info on US capacity factors here; nuclear is highest, producing around
90 percent of the time, while solar PV is lowest, at around 20 percent.)
</quote>

That doesn't make renewable energy a "Crock".

It makes it a significant and viable component of a sustainable
energy mix. Can renewable sources provide 100% of energy? First,
define "energy" - the electrical grid? All transportation?
Energy required for e.g. producing Steel, cement or aluminum (between the
three, they use more than 2% of all energy worldwide).

Post by Peter Flass
https://www.vox.com/2015/6/9/8748081/us-100-percent-renewable-energy

Note that article was written seven years ago, based on a stanford
study.

And even the article states:

"It is technically and economically feasible to run the US economy
entirely on renewable energy, and to do so by 2050."

Now, it is also clear that such steps as improved home insulation,
and improved energy efficiency across the board is required to
get to 100%.

Note that energy use has grown exponentially for the last 150
years. That cannot continue (for multiple reasons including
declining stored solar energy (oil), waste heat etc.). If it
does continue, we're only four hundred years away from a
planetary surface temperature of 212F.

https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/07/galactic-scale-energy/

Meanwhile, if we don't get the replacements (whether renewable
or nuclear - personally I think both are required) in time,
we're screwed again.

https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/10/the-energy-trap/

What they didn't state is that it would be politically feasible.

Ultimately, our current economic system is predicated on growth.
Economic growth is predicated on energy growth and population
growth. The latter is already starting to fall (China's in
particular should drop precipitously in a decade or two). Consider
that crypto-mining is wasting something like 30% of Texas'
daily electrical generation and lament the short-sightedness of
the modern capitalist system.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Scott Lurndal
Note that energy use has grown exponentially for the last 150
years. That cannot continue (for multiple reasons including
declining stored solar energy (oil), waste heat etc.). If it
does continue, we're only four hundred years away from a
planetary surface temperature of 212F.

That's OK, if our population continues doubling every 40 years
we're only six hundred years away from having one person for
every square meter of dry land on the planet.

Post by Scott Lurndal
Ultimately, our current economic system is predicated on growth.
Economic growth is predicated on energy growth and population
growth. The latter is already starting to fall (China's in
particular should drop precipitously in a decade or two).

And governments are freaking out, trying to encourage people to
have bigger families. Immigration is seen as a solution, with
the bonus that if you import skilled labour you can continue to
neglect your education system and dumb down the masses.

Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
-- Edward Abbey

[Mike Spencer]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Scott Lurndal
Note that energy use has grown exponentially for the last 150
years. That cannot continue (for multiple reasons including
declining stored solar energy (oil), waste heat etc.). If it
does continue, we're only four hundred years away from a
planetary surface temperature of 212F.

That's OK, if our population continues doubling every 40 years
we're only six hundred years away from having one person for
every square meter of dry land on the planet.

I knew Zanzibar wasn't going to be big enough! ;-)

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Scott Lurndal
Ultimately, our current economic system is predicated on growth.
Economic growth is predicated on energy growth and population
growth. The latter is already starting to fall (China's in
particular should drop precipitously in a decade or two).

And governments are freaking out, trying to encourage people to
have bigger families.

My old-fashioned dug well is pretty low in late September. Measured
again in December and extrapolating, I estimate I will have a towering
5' diameter column of water 40' tall in April. Can I get a posh job in
government?

Post by Charlie Gibbs
Immigration is seen as a solution, with the bonus that if you import
skilled labour you can continue to neglect your education system and
dumb down the masses.
Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
-- Edward Abbey

Just so.

[John Levine]

Post by Charlie Gibbs
That's OK, if our population continues doubling every 40 years

But it won't. The current world population is about 8 billion,
estimages say that in 2100 it'll still be under 11 billion.

We certainly have issues but standing room only isn't one of them.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by John Levine

Post by Charlie Gibbs
That's OK, if our population continues doubling every 40 years

But it won't. The current world population is about 8 billion,
estimages say that in 2100 it'll still be under 11 billion.
We certainly have issues but standing room only isn't one of them.

I'm pretty sure you're right. At least I hope you are.
But we're hearing so much about how slowing growth is a
disaster for The Economy. There will be a lot of effort
spent trying to keep that growth going. It won't be pretty -
unless you're at the top where the decision makers are.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by John Levine

Post by Charlie Gibbs
That's OK, if our population continues doubling every 40 years

But it won't. The current world population is about 8 billion,
estimages say that in 2100 it'll still be under 11 billion.
We certainly have issues but standing room only isn't one of them.

I'm pretty sure you're right. At least I hope you are.
But we're hearing so much about how slowing growth is a
disaster for The Economy. There will be a lot of effort
spent trying to keep that growth going. It won't be pretty -
unless you're at the top where the decision makers are.

It’s a disaster for the hucksters whose livelihood depends on convincing
people to buy lots of stuff they don’t need at prices they can’t afford.
IMHO a little deflation is a good thing.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Scott Lurndal
Note that energy use has grown exponentially for the last 150
years. That cannot continue (for multiple reasons including
declining stored solar energy (oil), waste heat etc.). If it
does continue, we're only four hundred years away from a
planetary surface temperature of 212F.

That's OK, if our population continues doubling every 40 years
we're only six hundred years away from having one person for
every square meter of dry land on the planet.

Post by Scott Lurndal
Ultimately, our current economic system is predicated on growth.
Economic growth is predicated on energy growth and population
growth. The latter is already starting to fall (China's in
particular should drop precipitously in a decade or two).

And governments are freaking out, trying to encourage people to
have bigger families. Immigration is seen as a solution, with
the bonus that if you import skilled labour you can continue to
neglect your education system and dumb down the masses.

Very short-sighted. Economists see growth, increasing consumerism, and
inflation as good things without looking at the big picture.

Post by Charlie Gibbs
Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
-- Edward Abbey

[Robin Vowels]

Post by Peter Flass
<quote>
One of the big challenges here is that wind and solar power plants have a
much lower "capacity factor" than plants that run on fuel. A fuel-based
plant can run around the clock (with breaks for maintenance), while wind
and solar plants produce energy only when the wind is blowing or sun is
shining.

Solar-thermal power stations can produce electricity around the clock.
These are already operating in the U.S.A. and in Spain.
.

Post by Peter Flass
Although a nuclear plant and a wind farm might have the same
"nameplate capacity" of 1 gigawatt, you'd actually need three or four wind
farms that size to produce the same number of MWh as the nuclear plant.
(EIA info on US capacity factors here; nuclear is highest, producing around
90 percent of the time, while solar PV is lowest, at around 20 percent.)
</quote>
https://www.vox.com/2015/6/9/8748081/us-100-percent-renewable-energy

[Dan Espen]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.


On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.

How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.

Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.
How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.
Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

It makes a lot of sense to stick solar panels in otherwise unused places.
Putting them over the parking lot also provides shade, but remember the 20%
factor I quoted. It’s not easy (currently, lacking practical
superconductors) to ship solar energy around to follow the sun and you
otherwise need some large-capacity storage. One way is to use pumped
storage, but I think people might object to this. It would be tough to
provide enough battery storage.

My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.
How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.
Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

It makes a lot of sense to stick solar panels in otherwise unused places.
Putting them over the parking lot also provides shade, but remember the 20%
factor I quoted. It’s not easy (currently, lacking practical
superconductors) to ship solar energy around to follow the sun and you
otherwise need some large-capacity storage. One way is to use pumped
storage, but I think people might object to this. It would be tough to
provide enough battery storage.
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

I forgot to mention that solar panels also have a limited lifespan. In 20
years there’s going to be a lot of stuff to recycle.

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Peter Flass
I forgot to mention that solar panels also have a limited lifespan. In 20
years there’s going to be a lot of stuff to recycle.

That problem is overstated. The panels are warranted for 25 to 30 years at
90% production. They'll continue to produce for years thereafter,
but at a lower production level. Sure, there will be failures, but
at a much lower rate than 100%.

[Dan Espen]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.
How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.
Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

It makes a lot of sense to stick solar panels in otherwise unused places.
Putting them over the parking lot also provides shade, but remember the 20%
factor I quoted. It’s not easy (currently, lacking practical
superconductors) to ship solar energy around to follow the sun and you
otherwise need some large-capacity storage. One way is to use pumped
storage, but I think people might object to this. It would be tough to
provide enough battery storage.

This is solar panels over a parking lot.
Finding the battery storage isn't going to be a problem.
At least on weekdays.

Post by Peter Flass
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

I remember in HS being taught about the problems encountered storing H2.
You need to store it under high pressure and it turns the metal of the
container brittle and it leaks. I know it can be stored as hydrides but I don't
think storage is a solved problem.

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.
How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.
Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

It makes a lot of sense to stick solar panels in otherwise unused places.
Putting them over the parking lot also provides shade, but remember the 20%
factor I quoted. It’s not easy (currently, lacking practical
superconductors) to ship solar energy around to follow the sun and you
otherwise need some large-capacity storage. One way is to use pumped
storage, but I think people might object to this. It would be tough to
provide enough battery storage.

This is solar panels over a parking lot.
Finding the battery storage isn't going to be a problem.
At least on weekdays.

There are a slew of storage systems in use, in development and
theorized. The most common today is probably pumped storage
where feasible. Austrilia uses large Tesla power packs to stablize
the grid.

As Dan noted, electric cars, trucks, tractors, et alia make
excellent storage elements.

Survey of storage 2012:
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6345071
Survey of storage 2021:
https://www.mdpi.com/2079-9292/10/16/2037/pdf?version=1629711454

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

I remember in HS being taught about the problems encountered storing H2.
You need to store it under high pressure and it turns the metal of the
container brittle and it leaks. I know it can be stored as hydrides but I don't
think storage is a solved problem.

H2 is pretty much a solved problem.

https://www.airbus.com/en/newsroom/news/2021-12-how-to-store-liquid-hydrogen-for-zero-emission-flight

https://www.airbus.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2022-05-airbus-increases-its-uk-innovation-footprint-to-develop-new

https://www.bp.com/en/global/air-bp/news-and-views/views/what-is-sustainable-aviation-fuel-saf-and-why-is-it-important.html

https://www.airbus.com/en/newsroom/news/2020-10-hydrogen-fuel-cells-explained

https://techcrunch.com/2021/04/14/zeroavias-hydrogen-fuel-cell-plane-ambitions-clouded-by-technical-challenges/

[Kerr-Mudd, John]

On Mon, 18 Jul 2022 21:13:56 GMT

Post by Scott Lurndal

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.
How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.
Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

It makes a lot of sense to stick solar panels in otherwise unused places.
Putting them over the parking lot also provides shade, but remember the 20%
factor I quoted. It’s not easy (currently, lacking practical
superconductors) to ship solar energy around to follow the sun and you
otherwise need some large-capacity storage. One way is to use pumped
storage, but I think people might object to this. It would be tough to
provide enough battery storage.

This is solar panels over a parking lot.
Finding the battery storage isn't going to be a problem.
At least on weekdays.

There are a slew of storage systems in use, in development and
theorized. The most common today is probably pumped storage
where feasible. Austrilia uses large Tesla power packs to stablize
the grid.
As Dan noted, electric cars, trucks, tractors, et alia make
excellent storage elements.
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6345071
https://www.mdpi.com/2079-9292/10/16/2037/pdf?version=1629711454

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

I remember in HS being taught about the problems encountered storing H2.
You need to store it under high pressure and it turns the metal of the
container brittle and it leaks. I know it can be stored as hydrides but I don't
think storage is a solved problem.

H2 is pretty much a solved problem.
https://www.airbus.com/en/newsroom/news/2021-12-how-to-store-liquid-hydrogen-for-zero-emission-flight
https://www.airbus.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2022-05-airbus-increases-its-uk-innovation-footprint-to-develop-new
https://www.bp.com/en/global/air-bp/news-and-views/views/what-is-sustainable-aviation-fuel-saf-and-why-is-it-important.html
https://www.airbus.com/en/newsroom/news/2020-10-hydrogen-fuel-cells-explained
https://techcrunch.com/2021/04/14/zeroavias-hydrogen-fuel-cell-plane-ambitions-clouded-by-technical-challenges/

Ok, it's a(n) hydrogen powered aircraft - but it's a Piper Alpha.

[maus]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but

provide enough battery storage.
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

Losses in transmission are too high.

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by maus

Post by Peter Flass
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

Losses in transmission are too high.

Use the solar power to split water into H2 and combine with CO2 from the atmosphere to
make synthetic fuels, which we know how to transport efficiently.

However, your assertion regarding transmission losses may no longer
be accurate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current

There already exist 2000 mile transmission lines that carry 12GW.

[D.J.]

On Mon, 18 Jul 2022 13:13:53 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.
How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.
Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

It makes a lot of sense to stick solar panels in otherwise unused places.
Putting them over the parking lot also provides shade, but remember the 20%
factor I quoted. It’s not easy (currently, lacking practical
superconductors) to ship solar energy around to follow the sun and you
otherwise need some large-capacity storage. One way is to use pumped
storage, but I think people might object to this. It would be tough to
provide enough battery storage.
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

Also the US Southwest has open areas, but much of that is ranch land
or Native American reservations.
--
Jim

[Peter Flass]

Post by D.J.
On Mon, 18 Jul 2022 13:13:53 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.
How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.
Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

It makes a lot of sense to stick solar panels in otherwise unused places.
Putting them over the parking lot also provides shade, but remember the 20%
factor I quoted. It’s not easy (currently, lacking practical
superconductors) to ship solar energy around to follow the sun and you
otherwise need some large-capacity storage. One way is to use pumped
storage, but I think people might object to this. It would be tough to
provide enough battery storage.
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

Also the US Southwest has open areas, but much of that is ranch land
or Native American reservations.
--
Jim

The locals would probably be happy to let utilities build solar farms on
unused land, if the price is right.

[D.J.]

On Tue, 19 Jul 2022 10:48:22 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Peter Flass

Post by D.J.
On Mon, 18 Jul 2022 13:13:53 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time global
warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us
all off. A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people
appear to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock,

On what basis do you make that claim? Be specific.

This is going to be ugly.
On my way to the gym I pass an office park. I large company just moved
in an they are installing solar panels above the parking lots. The area
is huge, maybe 200 cars can park under the panels. I haven't looked but
I assume there will be charging stations under the panels.
How cool is that? Some number of employees drive to work, get their car
charged while they work and they're good to go.
Today coming back from the gym an adult passes me on one of those
battery powered scooters. No large battery in sight. I went the same
way he was going for about 2 miles. I never did catch up with him.
Batteries keep getting better.

It makes a lot of sense to stick solar panels in otherwise unused places.
Putting them over the parking lot also provides shade, but remember the 20%
factor I quoted. It?s not easy (currently, lacking practical
superconductors) to ship solar energy around to follow the sun and you
otherwise need some large-capacity storage. One way is to use pumped
storage, but I think people might object to this. It would be tough to
provide enough battery storage.
My feeling is solar should be used on a large scale in places with lots of
sun and access to water to generate hydrogen for use as fuel. Arabia and
North Africa could be energy giants in the new economy.

Also the US Southwest has open areas, but much of that is ranch land
or Native American reservations.
--
Jim

The locals would probably be happy to let utilities build solar farms on
unused land, if the price is right.

Undoubtedly... but there are areas where the atmoic bombs were tested
out there. Best to avoid those.
--
Jim

[Scott Lurndal]

Post by D.J.
On Tue, 19 Jul 2022 10:48:22 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Peter Flass
The locals would probably be happy to let utilities build solar farms on
unused land, if the price is right.

Undoubtedly... but there are areas where the atmoic bombs were tested
out there. Best to avoid those.

Why? Perfect place for solar panels. It's not like the electricity they
produce would be radioactive. Even then, the levels of radiation on the
surface are minimal. Not to mention that the amount of land in the
test areas is a trivial fraction of the total.

I'm not sure you're visualizing just how big the southwestern united states
are, and how much land it encompasses.

In any case, panels on farmland works for some crops, panels over
irrigation canals is brilliant - achieve two goals with one panel, so
to speak (reduced evaporation and KwH).

There is plenty of empty desert. The grazing lands in the northern
tier would support panels just fine (assuming the transmission
infrastructure exists in all cases).

The entire western side of the San Joaquin valley (thousands of
square miles) is ripe for solar panels, and useless for much
else.

[D.J.]

Post by Scott Lurndal

Post by D.J.
On Tue, 19 Jul 2022 10:48:22 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Peter Flass
The locals would probably be happy to let utilities build solar farms on
unused land, if the price is right.

Undoubtedly... but there are areas where the atmoic bombs were tested
out there. Best to avoid those.

Why? Perfect place for solar panels. It's not like the electricity they
produce would be radioactive. Even then, the levels of radiation on the
surface are minimal. Not to mention that the amount of land in the
test areas is a trivial fraction of the total.

Monument Valley. a movie was made out there.

Post by Scott Lurndal
I'm not sure you're visualizing just how big the southwestern united states
are, and how much land it encompasses.

I've been to west Ttexas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Lots of places down
wind of Yucca Flats. Occasionally Vegas. Although that was downplayed
in the 1950s.

Post by Scott Lurndal
In any case, panels on farmland works for some crops, panels over
irrigation canals is brilliant - achieve two goals with one panel, so
to speak (reduced evaporation and KwH).

True.

Post by Scott Lurndal
There is plenty of empty desert. The grazing lands in the northern
tier would support panels just fine (assuming the transmission
infrastructure exists in all cases).
The entire western side of the San Joaquin valley (thousands of
square miles) is ripe for solar panels, and useless for much
else.

I didn't see much grazing land along route 66 in the 1950s. I haven't
been in the northern areas of those states. Going back to California
on a MATS flight about 1968, I had been home on leave, we flew back at
125 mph... on a C-123 goony bird. An aircraft that really does flap
its wings on take off.

Central Texas, to Colorado River and the big dam out there, then
northwest. While I did sleep part of the way, I didn't see much
grazing. I did see some circular irrigation for crops though.

--
Jim

[Andreas Kohlbach]

Post by D.J.

Post by Scott Lurndal

Post by D.J.
Undoubtedly... but there are areas where the atmoic bombs were tested
out there. Best to avoid those.

Why? Perfect place for solar panels. It's not like the electricity they
produce would be radioactive. Even then, the levels of radiation on the
surface are minimal. Not to mention that the amount of land in the
test areas is a trivial fraction of the total.

At least they let visit you the Trinity test site as a tourist attraction
since decades. I doubt they would if there was any danger.

Post by D.J.
Monument Valley. a movie was made out there.

Didn't that kill John Wayne?

[maus]

Post by Andreas Kohlbach

Post by D.J.

Post by Scott Lurndal

Post by D.J.
Undoubtedly... but there are areas where the atmoic bombs were tested
out there. Best to avoid those.

Why? Perfect place for solar panels. It's not like the electricity they
produce would be radioactive. Even then, the levels of radiation on the
surface are minimal. Not to mention that the amount of land in the
test areas is a trivial fraction of the total.

At least they let visit you the Trinity test site as a tourist attraction
since decades. I doubt they would if there was any danger.

Post by D.J.
Monument Valley. a movie was made out there.

Didn't that kill John Wayne?

As well as his nicotine addiction. Looking at him in "The Quiet Man", he
could hardly get through a scene without lighting a cigarette. John,
AFAIK, was not as near the explosions as some of the enlisted men, and I
think that explosion was during the filming of `gengis khan' somewhere
north of las vegas, Maureen O'Hara lasted better.

[John Levine]

Post by Scott Lurndal
In any case, panels on farmland works for some crops, panels over
irrigation canals is brilliant - achieve two goals with one panel, so
to speak (reduced evaporation and KwH).

I've seen proposals for panels over semi-arid areas spaced out enough
that there's enough sun for crops while limitin the evaporation.

Putting them over canals turns out not to work because of the wiring.
You need a block of cells for the wiring to work, not something 10 feet
wide and 100 miles long.

[Peter Flass]

Post by John Levine

Post by Scott Lurndal
In any case, panels on farmland works for some crops, panels over
irrigation canals is brilliant - achieve two goals with one panel, so
to speak (reduced evaporation and KwH).

I've seen proposals for panels over semi-arid areas spaced out enough
that there's enough sun for crops while limitin the evaporation.
Putting them over canals turns out not to work because of the wiring.
You need a block of cells for the wiring to work, not something 10 feet
wide and 100 miles long.

We’ll have to see. There’s a proposal now to put cells over the CAP canal
in Phoenix.

[Charlie Gibbs]

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock, but maybe it will be enough to
to keep us going until fusion comes on line. It’s no longer 30 years away,
now they’re talking about the next decade. One sure sign is that big
investors are starting to put money in.

Don't worry about it, population growth will offset any conservation
efforts, new supply, etc.

[Peter Flass]

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock, but maybe it will be enough to
to keep us going until fusion comes on line. It’s no longer 30 years away,
now they’re talking about the next decade. One sure sign is that big
investors are starting to put money in.

Don't worry about it, population growth will offset any conservation
efforts, new supply, etc.

A lot of things will offset. We used to have this thing called “paper
currency” that took a little energy to make the paper and print, and then
would stay in use for quite a while with no further energy expenditure. Now
we have this stupid thing called “bitcoin” that apparently requires a lot
of energy each time it is transferred. Oh well, it lets people pay for p*rn
anonymously, so it must be better.

[D.J.]

On Tue, 19 Jul 2022 10:48:18 -0700, Peter Flass

Post by Charlie Gibbs

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Dan Espen

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

It's just amazing how politics can make relatively sane people appear
to be morons.

Renewable energy is pretty much of a crock, but maybe it will be enough to
to keep us going until fusion comes on line. It’s no longer 30 years away,
now they’re talking about the next decade. One sure sign is that big
investors are starting to put money in.

Don't worry about it, population growth will offset any conservation
efforts, new supply, etc.

A lot of things will offset. We used to have this thing called “paper
currency” that took a little energy to make the paper and print, and then
would stay in use for quite a while with no further energy expenditure. Now
we have this stupid thing called “bitcoin” that apparently requires a lot
of energy each time it is transferred. Oh well, it lets people pay for p*rn
anonymously, so it must be better.

Its just fiat money, no real value.
--
Jim

[johnson]

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

Kemi Badenoch's characterization of the absurd 'Net Zero'
as unilateral economic disarmament is apt.

[D.J.]

On Mon, 18 Jul 2022 08:46:19 +0100, The Natural Philosopher

Post by The Natural Philosopher

Post by Peter Flass
but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Er no, by which time renewable energy policy will have killed us all off.
A bit of warming is nothing but good news

Ding dong, your brain is calling youuu !
--
Jim

[Robin Vowels]

Post by Peter Flass
What’s often done is to pick a base year older than the oldest date you
have to deal with. For example, if your company was started in 1970 you
can’t have order dates prior to that, so you can interpret order dates ‘00’
to ‘69’ as 2000 to 2069, and anything ‘70’ and above as 1970. This is only
a temporary kludge, but in this case it will work until 2070, by which time
global warming will have killed us all off.

Or, you can use PL/I, in which case the problem goes away.

[Robin Vowels]

Post by Andreas Kohlbach

Signed 8 bit for years before 1900? Makes no sense. Unsigned 8 bit
gets you pretty far. That doesn't sound like anything that would pass a
design review.
I worked with computers from 1964 until a few years ago.
I can't recall anyone abusing dates to save space.

Isn't this exactly what the Y2K problem was all about? Storing the
last two digits as characters seems just as arbitrary as using a
single 8bit binary value. True with just one more byte, overflow
isn't a problem, but if everyone used just two more bytes and kept
all characters in a year, Y2K wouldn't have been a problem.

The user enters that 2 digit year. If you want to store a 4 digit year,
some piece of software is going to have to figure out whether to add
'19' or '20'.

If the software allows 20XX... If not (and it's older) it might only
store two digits: possible Y2K impact.

When you want to enter a credit card expiration year, no one has the
patience to enter 20xx for the next 100 years.

I see that in web form pulldown menus are used giving the current and may
be 10 next years (like 2030) to just click.

I did a lot of Y2K remediation. Rarely was the correct solution to ask
the user to enter a 4 digit year. I can't recall that ever happening.

After 1999, I expected that everyone would have learnt from the mistakes of the past,
and start writing 2000, etc. for the years.
But no!
Banks especially dropped the two leading digits and so we will be back with
the Y2k problem at the year 2199

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Or it was static. So the 19 was fixed (and not saved) and the user added
the rest. So when 1985 he just typed "85" and the machine would likely
also only store "85".