IBM Mainframe Forum

Hi,

Could you please let me know from where I can download PC/370.

Jaggz

Are you wanting the mainframe cross-assembler that runs on a PC?

rather than PC/370 better use
the z390 Portable Mainframe Assembler and Emulator
http://www.z390.org/
more up to date with assembler syntax and instruction set

A semi unrelated question, for my own curiosity. Does PC/370 run in Win 7 or Win Vista?

When I researched z390 some months ago I noticed PC/370's author seemed to be in the z390 camp.

Going back to Jaggz: since you appear to have a mainframe at your disposal, why would you want to bother with something like PC/370 or z390?

Dear Steve/all,

Are there any manual on BAL(Basic Assembler Language) to read and practise few exercises ?

Jaggz

I'm not aware of any manuals with possible exercises. There are some textbooks floating around. Others may have titles. There have been titles mentioned in topics in the Assembler section of this forum. A Google search for PC/370 will turn up some textbook titles if you have the patience to go through some of the links, though these may be oriented towards the now obsolete PC/370 product. Similarly, a Google search for z390 may turn up some suggestions.

I started out doing things that looked interesting, but that was 40+ years ago, though the same exercises can still be done. Writing a program that lists a PDS directory in the same general format as the IEHLIST LISTPDS function is just as challenging for a beginner as it was for me in early 1969. Replicating the IEBPTPCH PRINT TYPORG=PO is another good exercise for a beginner; you'll learn quite a lot about READ/CHECK and deblocking data blocks, as well as using FIND ttrn,C to point to the first block of a member using the TTR you obtain from reading a directory.

One thing that beginners have trouble with is conversions from binary to text and from text to binary. Learn those conversions and learn them well; you will find you need them all the time. Don't make the mistake of using band aides like the Assist XDECO / XDECI macros. Use this opportunity to learn the ED instruction for simple conversions, this will be helpful later on when you may be faced with more complex conversions.

Doing these exercises will inevitably lead to errors and dumps. These will not be complex dumps, so use this opportunity to learn the basics of how to read a "simple" dump; this will be an extremely useful skill later on.

Good luck!

Dear Steve,

Thanks for injecting the Assembler interest and your explanation can make anybody to put more interest to learn BAL. I strongly feel that assembler is a main pre-requisite for any Mainframe system programmers to understand the Z/OS architecture.

You might start from here
http://www.simotime.com/indexasm.htm

jaggz wrote:... I strongly feel that assembler is a main pre-requisite for any Mainframe system programmers to understand the Z/OS architecture.

<Personal opinion on>Yes and no. A number of different operating systems, ranging from Linux through z/OS have been hosted on the raw hardware, and the knowledge of the hardware imparted from learning at least some Assembler is not very useful in understanding the architecture of the operating system. If that's your goal, understanding the system architecture as expressed in a dump will be your primary achievement.<Personal opinion off>

steve-myers wrote:

jaggz wrote:... I strongly feel that assembler is a main pre-requisite for any Mainframe system programmers to understand the Z/OS architecture.

<Personal opinion on>Yes and no. A number of different operating systems, ranging from Linux through z/OS have been hosted on the raw hardware, and the knowledge of the hardware imparted from learning at least some Assembler is not very useful in understanding the architecture of the operating system. If that's your goal, understanding the system architecture as expressed in a dump will be your primary achievement.<Personal opinion off>

And I have personally seen Steve read thru a dump spewing off Opt codes and converting hex to binary..... saying "what the heck are they doing that for"
good ole days @ Boeing