| Features | Please be sure to read the abstract below each article title to see if the article applies to your application(s). |
Put Your Year 2000 Worries Behind You—Use Our COBOL Conversion Service
NIH’s Year 2000 Testing Facility Is Ready—Are You?
CERTAN Update
Web Sponsor (Phase II) Is Available for Evaluation
RACF Protection through SILK Web Coming Next Month
Announcing IMAP—New E-Mail Access from Multiple Computers
E-Mail to BITNET Users—Address Changes Required Soon
CONNECT:Direct TCP/IP Support—Are You Interested?
Changes in Support for ADSM Clients on Older Operating Systems
NIH Gopher Server To Be Decommissioned in January
XNS Protocol.—Gone!
Oracle Licenses Are Available from DCRT
A New Edition of the User’s Guide Is Available
Yearly Documentation Subscription Renewal Ends in 30 Days
Holiday Service Schedule
DCRT Training Records Set in 1997
Don’t let January 1, 2000 test your applications for you. Use DCRT’s full range of COBOL conversion services—including preparation, actual conversion, and testing. Call TASC now to discuss your conversion needs.
A separate MVS system is now available to NIH Computer Center customers for testing applications for Year 2000 compliance. The testing cycle (for years 1999, 2000, and 2001) will take just one month and be available to the North and South system users on alternate months.
Progress has been made on the final CERTAN acquisitions. The Network Infrastructure acquisition—to provide enhancements to NIHnet—had a revised RFP issued on October 27, with an announced due date of January 8, 1998.
"Web Sponsor" uses the strengths of a web interface to greatly simplify sponsor’s account management. Now available for evaluation, this newest phase allows sponsors to perform all of the functions available in ENTER SPONSOR (e.g., add new users, close accounts, reassign initials, reset passwords). Sponsors who help in evaluating this phase will help ensure that the facility is as useful as possible for all sponsors.
On January 26, 1998, all registered users of the MVS South system will have access to SILK RACF. This new facility will permit you to change a RACF password, display attributes of RACF-protected resources, as well as create, maintain, or delete RACF protection—all through the web. SILK RACF will eventually replace WYLBUR’s ENTER RACF.
IMAP (Internet message access protocol) Version 4 is now available for remote mail users of Helix and the NIH post office servers. IMAP has the ability to access messages (both new and saved) from more than one computer—that is, e-mail stored on an IMAP server can be handled from the office, home or while travelling without having to transfer messages back and forth. Features of this version make IMAP an attractive alternative to the post office protocol (POP) mail service.
As of December 28, 1997, the NIHCU node will no longer be part of BITNET. All e-mail addresses and e-mail software that reference the NIHCU BITNET node—or use the address form user%nodename.BITNET@CU.NIH.GOV—must be changed by December 28 or they will cease to work.
Recently the NIH Computer Center added support for TCP/IP to transfer data between the MVS South system and the Enterprise Open System. We would like to determine how much interest exists for using CONNECT:Direct to transfer data between various servers and the MVS Enterprise system. For some applications, CONNECT:Direct has advantages over FTP in transferring data between TCP/IP systems.
Are you currently executing backups via the ADSM DOS or Windows 3.x (16-bit) client software? We will discontinue support for the DOS clients after March 31, 1998. Please use the web form at the NBARS (NIH Backup and Recovery Service) webpage to let us know if you still need the Windows 3.x client.
After five years of service, the NIH Gopher Server will be retiring on January 15, 1998. Many of the services that were offered on Gopher have already moved to a web server. As additional services move, their new web addresses are being posted on the Gopher server.
In September the Xerox Network System (XNS) protocol was removed from the NIHnet backbone routers, when the one remaining XNS-enabled institute no longer required connectivity.
DCRT has negotiated Enterprise Oracle licenses for NIH at very advantageous prices. These licenses can be purchased from DCRT for Microsoft Windows NT, Digital Alpha, Sun Solaris, and Pyramid platforms. Oracle8 is also available for these platforms.
An updated version of the NIH Computer Center User’s Guide for the MVS South system is now available.
If you wish to continue receiving updates during 1998—you should renew your publication subscriptions before the renewal period ends January 15, 1998.
The ALW, Helix and MVS (North and South) systems will have several days of unattended service between December 22 and January 4.
| Technical Notes | Please be sure to read the abstract below each article title to see if the article applies to your application(s). |
Formsmail—E-Mailing Information from Web Forms in One Easy Step
This new SILK Web technologies facility is a simple mechanism for sending the contents collected via an online web form directly to a predetermined e-mail address.
Linking MVS Data Sets with Webpages in a SILK Customized Server
SILK customized server owners can easily associate MVS data sets with webpages (or URLs)—a drop-down list box allows you to select the appropriate document type (e.g., html, text, text with carriage control, suffix).
Printing and Downloading from WYLBUR via the Web
Using the SILK Web facility, you can easily print the contents of a WYLBUR active file
on your local PC printer or download it to your workstation. Once the data is in an
active file, merely save (or resave) it with a dsname beginning with "@WWW" and ".txt" as the dsname’s last qualifier.
Are Your WYLBUR Dates Ready for the Year 2000?
You can easily check for non-compliant date functions in the CPs you use by using the "YEAR2000 flag." The non-compliant dates can be fixed with the new, enhanced
WYLBUR date functions that will go into effect on January 26.
New MVS/ESA Operating System To Be Installed
The NIH Computer Center is planning to install a new release of the MVS/ESA operating system for both the MVS North and South systems. This level (OS/390 Version 2, Release 4) has many enhancements and is Year 2000 compliant. If you have installed third-party software on the systems, please check with the vendors to ensure that such software is supported and will still function in the new environment.
QWS3270 Emulation Software—Upgrade to the Commercial Version at No Extra Charge
DCRT’s Computing Facilities Branch has purchased a site license for a PC-based TN3270 client called QWS3270 PLUS. Unlike the freeware version, QWS3270 PLUS is a commercial version that is fully compatible with the server software running on the MVS systems. Registered users are encouraged to upgrade to this robust version as soon as possible.
Evaluators Wanted for DB2 Version 5
CFB’s Database Technologies Unit is planning to make DB2 Version 5 available in early 1998. We would like evaluators to test the new features of this version.
Control-T Goes Live at Last
Control-T—the tape management system on NIH Computer Center’s MVS
South system—has been scheduled for production December 14.
Reminder—After December 31, DB2 Subsystem DSNT Will Be Gone
The newer DB2 subsystems—DSND and DSNP—have been in place for over a year.
Updated Model 204 Helps Year 2000 Compliance
The production version of Model 204 (Version 4.1) on the MVS North system has all the
capabilities and features for applications to be fully functional in the Year 2000 (Y2K).
Y2K compliance will not happen automatically for any Model 204 application programmers must modify the date routines and incorporate new parameter settings.
New Software + More Processors + More Memory = Better Performance
Recent hardware and software enhancements to the Helix systems’ Silicon Graphics (SGI) computers include additional processors, much more memory, more disk space, as
well as new operating system and programming language software. These enhancements
greatly simplify program development and improve performance on computationally
intensive tasks.
Convex System To Be Retired
The Convex system (coil.nih.gov) will be decommissioned on February 28, 1998, after
eight years of service. The Helix systems now offer several alternatives to the Convex for performing computationally intensive applications. Most of the system and user applications running on the Convex have been transferred to other computer platforms (primarily Helix and Churn).
Interface 203 (December 15, 1997)