Newsgroups: comp.arch
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: What is a Mainframe?
Message-ID: <1989Jul15.220613.9054@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <125@ssp1.idca.tds.philips.nl> <20752@winchester.mips.COM> <27637@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV> <164@bms-at.UUCP> <1604@gazette.bcm.tmc.edu>
Date: Sat, 15 Jul 89 22:06:13 GMT

In article <1604@gazette.bcm.tmc.edu> rick@pavlov.tmc.edu (Richard H. Miller) writes:
>>... most mainframes run dinosaur OS's that have never heard of
>>a source archive.  (Programmers tend not to use macros with their
>>assembler, let alone a high level language.)
>
>I have worked with mainframes systems for close to 15 years including IBM,
>DEcsystem-10s and Unisys 1100. I can assue you that system software for these
>systems include extensive use of MACROs. This is the only way to do the
>software ...

In fact, there is generally a strong correlation between the sophistication
of the assembler's macro facilities and the extent to which people are
expected to use assembler for "real" programming.  The reason Unix assemblers
generally don't have *any* macro facility is that nobody uses them for
routine programming.  (When you're doing speed-critical code or the bottom-
level kernel primitives, you usually don't want macros hiding the details
of the code.)

Back in the pre-Unix days when I did a lot of assembler, it wasn't uncommon
to run into macro packages that were almost high-level languages.
-- 
$10 million equals 18 PM       |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
(Pentagon-Minutes). -Tom Neff  | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu