What's Up DOCumentation Robelle Consulting Ltd. Unit 201, 15399-102A Ave. Surrey, B.C. Canada V3R 7K1 Phone: (604) 582-1700 Fax: (604) 582-1799 Date: February 4, 1993 From: Robert M. Green, CEO David J. Greer, President Michael Shumko, Editor To: Users of Robelle Software Re: News of the HP 3000, 1993 #1 What You Will Find in This News Memo: News Tidbits Calendar of Events Qedit Version 4.1 Released - "Users Enhance Qedit" Technical Tips Shameless Plugs X-Windows, hpterm, and Qedit Visual, by David Greer Robelle Product Training Robelle Products: Problems, Solutions, and Suggestions News Tidbits MPE/iX 4.5 Released. HP is shipping MPE/iX 4.5, and most users don't realize the extent of the changes. We have been beta-testing 4.5 in-house for several months, but we couldn't share any news because we were restricted by HP confidentiality agreements. This is the most radical release ever of new features for the HP 3000, and that includes the first release of MPE/XL. We will be reporting in more detail later, once we check a few things in the official 4.5 release. In the meantime, see the article by Isaac Blake in the latest issue of Interex Press and read this excerpt from the January 1993 Sigsysman newsletter. >>> ATTENTION ANYONE CONTEMPLATING UPDATING TO MPE/iX 4.5! <<< There is so much danger in this major update to MPE/iX -- certainly more major than the ".5" would imply -- that I will need to digest the detailed warnings I have received over the past month before incorporating that information into a newsletter. However, if you are intent on being the first one in your area to be POSIX compliant, at the very least please contact Isaac Blake (CIS: 76047,152; Internet: 76047.152@compuserve.com; phone: 602-350-8218; fax: 602-350-8366. He has extensive experience with 4.5 and may be the foremost authority on its pitfalls. When we called Isaac to get permission to print his telephone number, he passed on this late-breaking news: Do not attempt a Reload on MPE/iX 4.5. He did, and was down for two days! All his files had their Creator names set to zero. If you must do a Reload, call the Response Center (1-800-633-3600) for a workaround procedure. [Bob Green] Computers are Wonderful. G.C. Blodgett's auto insurance rate tripled when he turned 101; this was the computer program's first driver over 100, and he was converted into a teenager. [From the Communications of the ACM] Nova DAT Drives Need Patch. If you are upgrading from MPE/iX 3.1 to 4.0 and you have a 2-gigabyte SCSI DAT drive, you will need to install a firmware patch before you update to MPE/iX 4.0. Otherwise, it will be impossible to read 1.3-gigabyte DATs, the type commonly used by Robelle and other vendors. Several sites did not get the neon orange warning sheets with their 4.0 tapes and had to back out of the Update process. [E.A. Kilroy, Orbit Software] Robelle and HP-UX. For the last nine months we have been doing research on HP-UX. We have been porting some of our code to HP-UX, but mostly we have been learning how HP-UX works, what it is good at, and what it isn't so good at. Many users have heard that UNIX in general is cryptic. Our experience is that cryptic may be too generous. Here is an example of a backup error message on our 705 HP-UX workstation: /dev/rmt/0m: cannot create The problem? We don't really know. We had inserted a DDS tape into the DDS drive. We ejected the tape, put it back in, tried the backup again, and everything worked fine. [David Greer] Image 3000 Handbook. Now that IMAGE/SQL has extended the life of TurboIMAGE, there may be renewed interest in The Image 3000 Handbook. This is a book put together by David Greer, Alfredo Redo, Bob Green, Dennis Heidner, and others, to explain everything you need to know about IMAGE. Copies can be ordered from the publisher: Wordware, Box 14300-T, Seattle, Washington 98114. [Marie Froese] Suprtool and Lotus 1-2-3. Watch this space next issue for an article by Dennis Smetsers, who works for SAMCO, our Dutch dealer. Dennis shows how to use Suprtool to create files suitable for loading into PC spreadsheets such as Lotus 1-2-3. He describes how to extract data from IMAGE databases, flat files or spoolfiles, creating Suprtool `comma delimited' files. Calendar of Events April 1993 * Robelle in Seattle April 5-7 for the Interex ICMS Manager Conference. Marie Froese and Neil Armstrong look forward to meeting you. * Asian tour by Robelle's David Greer and Dave Lo. Watch this calendar for further details. May 1993 * Paul Gobes and Ken Robertson of Robelle will operate an exciting sales booth at the Scrug Meeting, May 5-6. Bring your technical questions, Paul and Ken are ready. * Bob Green hosts a half-day seminar for the Swedish users group on May 10th. Topics to be covered include improving software quality, making batch jobs faster and improving on-line response time. Qedit Version 4.1 Released "Users Enhance Qedit" Qedit for MPE/iX and MPE/V is Robelle's full-screen editor that also has line-mode editing for use in batch jobs. Robelle is still going strong, even in these recent hard times. This is due in large part to Robelle's loyal customers who recognize that Qedit is a powerful and cost-effective tool for programmers and MIS staff. Qedit is developed and constantly enhanced using Robelle's "Step by Step" development methodology, a significant component of which is feedback from users. Qedit version 4.1 contains dozens of user-requested enhancements. Best Enhancement Choosing one enhancement over another as the best is purely subjective, but one enhancement stands out. A year ago Robelle introduced the Spell utility, a program that checks a file for English spelling. This year Qedit includes a built-in Spell command which operates on a range of lines instead of on a whole file. The Spell command highlights each error, and optionally can go into Modify mode on each line that has an error. Related to the Spell command is the Word command which lets you look up words in the spelling dictionary by partial or soundex match. This is handy when Spell reports a typo but you don't know the correct spelling. Most Popular Enhancements Our choice of which enhancements to include in this release was based largely on the "squeaky wheel" principle. The more people who asked for something, and the more vocal they were about it, the more chance there was that we would do it. Here are some of the enhancements that we made, which a large number of people requested we do: * Accept Vesoft-style redo commands (e.g., comma-comma for Redo). * Implement MPE/iX I/O redirection within Qedit. * Emulate the new MPE/iX Redo command options in Qedit's Redo and Modify commands (e.g., > to lengthen a line, C to change strings). * Allow users to configure Visual mode to NOT clear your terminal memory. * Support a Visual mode word-wrap capability in Reflection for DOS. * Increase support for 132-column Visual mode in Reflection for Windows. Most Enhancements Without a doubt the winner of the Most Ideas award goes to Glenn Cole, an independent consultant in the Maryland area. During a Qedit tutorial at the 1991 San Diego Interex conference, Glenn requested a half-dozen enhancements within 45 minutes. This year Glenn single-handedly accounted for two dozen entries in our enhancement tracking system. Close runners-up were E.A. Kilroy from Orbit Software, Randy Medd of Telamon, and the support staff at Vesoft, each with over twenty suggestions. We thank everybody who took the time to phone, fax or mail their enhancement suggestions and bug reports to us. Qedit would not be the same without your involvement. Robelle Remembers MPE/V Qedit is an important tool for many MPE/V sites. This year we added support for "Hppath" to Qedit/V (i.e., searching a list of groups to find command files), following an eloquent request by Randy Medd of Telamon on behalf of all MPE/V sites. Gord Treasure of Cameco complained that Qedit/V prompted him four times for a lockword on each Text and Keep, then lost his lockword unless he mentioned it explicitly. Once we learned that new MPE/V intrinsic features could solve the problem, we shipped Gord a new Qedit/V with lockword support. Editing Escape Sequences For years Qedit has allowed you to edit escape sequences in Visual mode by displaying the Escape character as any character of your choice. Qedit version 4.1 makes this feature easier to use, thanks to ideas and testing by E.A. Kilroy. Qedit is now consistent in its treatment of the Escape character, and does not allow you to accidentally translate legitimate occurrences of your surrogate character into Escape. Distribution North American Qedit users on support should have received their 4.1 update tape by now. Distribution outside the USA and Canada should be complete within 6 weeks. Qedit users whose service has lapsed can get back on service without penalty or back charges. By paying the service fee for the current year, they receive the Qedit 4.1 update and one year of support. HP 3000 sites that do not have Qedit can obtain a demonstration copy without charge by phoning Robelle at (604) 582-1700 in North America or the appropriate Robelle distributor in their country. Technical Tips CM Programs with Multiple Extents. On MPE/V, a program file with multiple extents will not run. On MPE/iX, it is not easy to get the :Prep command to create a CM program file (code 1029) with only one extent. When you develop on MPE/iX and run on MPE/V, :Restore usually converts multi-extent programs into a single extent. However, in certain situations such as disc fragmentation, :Restore will create the CM program file with multiple extents, making it impossible to :Run. This happened to us with a recent pre-release of our software. Now we use the following command file on MPE/iX after every :Prep command: parm filename if finfo('temp123', 'exists') purge temp123,temp endif file input=!filename file output=temp123;temp;disc=,1,1 run suprtool.pub.robelle;parm=16 purge !filename rename temp123,!filename,temp save !filename Warning for TurboIMAGE on MPE/iX 4.0. Certain versions of TurboIMAGE shipped with MPE/iX 4.0 contain a bug that surfaces when you go into Dbutil and Enable For Prefetch. The bug causes the control block to be marked as corrupt, when it is not, aborting the user's transactions. No actual corruption occurs, but the user will have to get out of the database. All will return to normal once you Disable For Prefetch. Apparently a patch is available for those who do not wish to wait for this new feature in the MPE/iX 4.5 release. The Response Center has further information. [Steve Cooper, Allegro] Error in "Updating with Suprtool". There was an error in the last news memo in the article on "Updating Records with Suprtool". In step 3, the command input badfile should be input badfile=d-sales. Making Lines into HP Variables. For those who have installed Qedit 4.1, it is now possible to put text lines into variables. Create a single line command file with an Input statement in it. Find the line you want, Hold it, then invoke the command file but re-direct input from the hold file. /add 1 input myline 2 // /keep setline {save the command file} /text phonebk /hold "travel" {copy line to Hold file 25 Marlin Travel, Celeste 584-2523 /setline < hold {use I/O redirection} /showvar myline {check the variable} MYLINE = Marlin Travel, Celeste 584-2523 Typo in "LaserJet Lustre". One astute customer called in to Robelle technical support with an unusual question - he was trying to print to an attached printer using the example in our "LaserJet Lustre" paper. On page 36 in Appendix A of the paper, line 030 is missing an "&" and should read: 030 05 filler pic x(7) value "&p1p20C". Our text formatter, Prose, swallowed up the "&", treating it as a special character. The description of printing to attached printers that appears on page 10 of the paper is correct. Our apologies to anyone who tried this example and couldn't get it to work. [Ken Robertson] How to Skip the Global Qeditmgr File? Sometimes you would like to bypass the Qeditmgr configuration file in Pub.Sys and/or Pub.Robelle, but we don't let the user redefine them with a :File equation for security reasons (e.g., if you force compiles into DS, you may not want that bypassed). There is a way, however, for you as the system manager to make Qeditmgr optional. Add the command :setjcw skipqeditmgr = 0 to the Qedit UDC and add two commands to the global Qeditmgr file: if skipqeditmgr = 0 then {at start of Qeditmgr} {existing configuration commands} endif {at end of Qeditmgr} Users will still have Qedit configured to their liking, but can disable the configuration by setting the JCW and accessing Qedit without the UDC: :setjcw skipqeditmgr = 1 :run qedit.pub.robelle Shameless Plug Marilyn Glick of Time Systems just purchased Suprtool and had this to say: "I rewrote our end-of-day balancing program combining Suprtool with Quiz. This cut the processing time from 15 minutes to about 1 minute. This resulted in smiles from our very hardworking order entry staff." X-Windows, hpterm, and Qedit Visual By David Greer When working with one of HP's workstations such as the 705, it is difficult to get a terminal window working correctly with Qedit's Visual mode. When using a workstation, the hpterm program must be used to provide block-mode emulation for HP 3000 programs. The vt3k program provides the data communications to the HP 3000. Here is one method to successfully combine these tools to connect to an HP 3000 and have Qedit Visual mode work: 1. Open a terminal window (double-click the terminal icon in the HP VUE screen). 2. At the HP-UX command prompt, enter this command: hpterm -ti 2392A -n system -title system -e vt3k system & You would normally replace system with the name of the system that you were trying to log on to. For example, if Goofy was the name of your HP 3000, you would use: hpterm -ti 2392A -n goofy -title goofy -e vt3k goofy & The options used in hpterm are: -ti Terminal id that hpterm responds with. Note that it must be 2392A and the letter "A" must be in upper case. -n Name that HP VUE will display if you minimize the hpterm window. -title Name that HP VUE will display in the title line of the hpterm window. -e Program to execute. This must be the last parm on the command line. & The ampersand causes HP-UX to run hpterm in the background. This makes your original terminal window available for executing other HP-UX commands. After you execute the hpterm command line, you will be connected to your HP 3000. At this point you enter the standard MPE Hello command. After running Qedit, you should be able to use Visual mode as usual. Robelle Product Training Robelle provides its customers with product training at prices that won't break their budget. If you've been thinking about increasing your knowledge of Qedit or Suprtool, chances are we have a training session that will suit your needs. We have courses that are geared towards training your entire staff or just one individual. Regardless of which product you are using, you can easily increase productivity in your shop by attending these sessions. We are currently planning our schedule for 1993 and would like to hear from you if you are interested in product training this year. We expect to have our first session this spring here in Vancouver, Canada. This has always been popular with our customers so we need to hear from you soon if you would like to attend. For more information regarding product training, call Rosemary Van Poelgeest at (604) 582-1700. Robelle Products: Problems, Solutions, and Suggestions Qedit Version 4.1 Running Qedit from Speedware Version 6. Things can go wrong when you invoke Qedit inside Speedware Version 6. First, upon returning from Visual mode to a menu with line drawing, the screen is jumbled. And second, the function keys are wrong. These problems also happen when running Vplus programs from within Speedware. The first problem occurs because Speedware counts on specific tab stops and cursor positions; use the undocumented INP ">R" function to reset the terminal. The second problem is solved either by doing Set Vis Save On in Qedit to save and restore the original function keys, or using the Print command in Speedware to reset them explicitly. Below is a sample Speedware Logic procedure to call Qedit and properly reset the terminal and function keys upon return. Thanks to Gaston DelMedico and others at Garrett Canada for assisting with this problem. [Neil Armstrong] LOGIC-QEDIT-RUN: COMMAND "FILE EDTTEXT=MYTEXT"; RUN 'QEDIT.PUB.ROBELLE,BASICENTRY;PARM=4;INFO="VISUAL;EXIT"'; ON TERMINAL DO BEGIN INP ">R"; PRINT "<27>f1k3L<27>p"; PRINT "<27>f2k3L<27>q"; PRINT "<27>f3k3L<27>r"; PRINT "<27>f4k3L<27>s"; PRINT "<27>f5k3L<27>t"; PRINT "<27>f6k3L<27>u"; PRINT "<27>f7k3L<27>v"; PRINT "<27>f8k3L<27>w"; END; EXIT; Where am I? Let Qeditmgr Help. The following Qeditmgr file can be used to identify which machine you are on, when you are inside another program (like E-Mail) and also to set special settings for when dialing in from home. They work because certain JCWs or HP variables have been pre-set. [Paul Gobes] Hpsysname is set to the name of our machines (Goofy or Pluto). Insidexpress is set to one when Xpress E-mail program is run. Hpldevin is tested because our dial-in modem ports are devices 100-105. if hpsysname = "PLUTO" then {remote machine} set prompt "Pluto /" {identify system} elseif hpsysname = "GOOFY" then {my regular system} run cookie.qlib.robelle;parm=256 {I like jokes} set prompt "Goofy / " {our other cpu} endif if insidexpress = 1 then {inside E-mail} set hint off {no time for hints} set prompt "xp /" {change the prompt} endif if hpldevin >=100 and hpldevin <=105 {modem ldevs} q "Setting record mode " {display reminder} set list record on {lp lists to slave printer} endif Personalized Cobol Tagging. In a recent Qedit training course, Julie Barnes from California Eastern Labs wanted an easy way to identify which programmer last changed the Cobol source and when it was done. And it had to be done with a single Qeditmgr file. We came up with the following commands to put in the Qeditmgr.Pub.Sys file. They rely on having a standard way of logging on; in this case we use SECURITY/3000 from Vesoft to enforce session names. You could also use the hpuser variable if the programmers have unique user names. [Paul Gobes] set X yymmdd if hpjobname = "PAUL" then set X "pg" yymmdd endif if hpjobname = "NEIL" then set X "na" yymmdd endif if hpjobname = "MIKE" then set X "ms" yymmdd endif Suprtool Version 3.4 NetBase + Prefetch Crashes System. A customer using NetBase from Quest and Suprtool Pre-Release version 3.4.04 reported a problem. Suprtool versions 3.4.04 and later are using prefetch to speed up access to input files and datasets. It seems NetBase convinces Suprtool that a remote database is on a local machine. Therefore, Suprtool attempts to use prefetch and this causes a system failure. To disable prefetch on these remote files use the Suprtool command: set prefetch 0 {zero} This can be included in the Suprmgr.Pub.Sys file to disable prefetch for all tasks. We have warned the sites that have both Netbase and the Suprtool pre-release. Robelle and Quest are currently working on a solution to this problem. [Robyn Rennie] Sort Disc Space. Those of you who are on MPE/iX may have noticed that Sort.Pub.Sys uses a scratch file that is twice the size of the input file. This is unlike Sort/V, whose scratch file was the same size as the input. Like Sort/V, the Suprtool sort uses a scratch file equal to the input file. So if you are running out of disc space on MPE/iX, use Suprtool instead of Sort.Pub.Sys to do your sorts. Speeding Up Suprtool. Hint: on MPE/V, Suprtool reads files faster if the block size is a multiple of 128 words (256 bytes). This is due to some `deblocking' done by MPE/V before handing the records to Suprtool. We have seen some cases speed up by a factor of over ten times just by reblocking the file. For example, on MPE/V reading 200,000 80-byte records blocked by 1 took 1500 seconds, whereas blocked by 16 took only 108 seconds. (80 x 16 = 1280 bytes, a multiple of 256.) Without reblocking, the task can sometimes be made a little faster by adding NOMR to the file command for the input file, but this does not give the dramatic benefits that reblocking to a multiple of 128 words provides. Note that none of this applies to MPE/iX. Xpress Version 2.9 International Mail. Recently we shipped a pre-release version of Xpress to a few customers who were interested in making Xpress work with Asian two-byte character sets, e.g., Chinese or Kanji. We welcome feedback on this new capability.