RE: z/OS on the ISERIES

Is it a fair statement to say "zSeries [is] EBCDIC"?

>From the zPOP:

"Although the System/360 architecture was originally designed to support
The Extended Binary-Coded-Decimal Interchange Code (EBCDIC), the
Instructions and data formats of the architecture are for the most part
independent of the external code which is to be processed by the machine.
For most instructions, all 256 possible combinations of bit patterns for a
Particular byte can be processed, independent of the character which the
bit pattern is intended to represent ... a machine operating in
Accordance with z/Architecture can process EBCDIC, ASCII, or any other
code which can be represented in eight or fewer bits per character."

It's really z/OS, its subsystems, and its typical applications that are
EBCDIC, not the zSeries hardware. In other words, the fact that OS/400 is
EBCDIC based is a very small advantage in zSeries emulation on iSeries
hardware (relative to, e.g., Pentium hardware).

OTOH, other hardware characteristics such as the native I/O architecture may
provide certain relative advantages - I don't know enough to comment.

Charles

-----Original Message-----
From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:IBM-MAIN@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Of Phil Payne
Sent: Sunday, January 15, 2006 1:41 PM
To: IBM-MAIN@xxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: z/OS on the ISERIES


Some markings and indentations upthread ascribe comments to me that I did
not make.

There's no doubt that IBM is some way down the road with an emulation
product - there are far
too many rumours coming out of the wainscotting for it not to be true.
Those rumours,
however, have very little substance.

What has most interested me is the speed with which this beast has appeared.
If we are
looking at the end of a long project, then the first part of it was done
under much more
effective security that ever before seen. I'm sceptical.

I think we're looking at the results of a relatively short-term project.
This might make a
great deal of sense if we postulate zArchitecture on the iSeries.
Crucially, both iSeries and
zSeries are EBCDIC.

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