Path: csiph.com!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!individual.net!not-for-mail From: vallor Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc,comp.os.linux.misc,alt.politics.usa Subject: Re: Still Going - IRS Still Using JFK-Era Computers Date: 18 Aug 2024 02:24:26 GMT Lines: 91 Message-ID: References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: individual.net qTu+K5rmwb7AuIoZkmCMrgt+k2agkXm9+ZOT0IiB7brkfIsA/F Cancel-Lock: sha1:l6Tx8Z/XmjHonnArMdJSRsA5y0c= sha256:ZdM0R5WUjqt3daeTZcPqCwRysepqECvXzgJPz6iNFU0= X-Face: +McU)#<-H?9lTb(Th!zR`EpVrp<0)1p5CmPu.kOscy8LRp_\u`:tW;dxPo./(fCl CaKku`)]}.V/"6rISCIDP` User-Agent: Pan/0.160 (Toresk; b2470fe; Linux-6.11.0-rc3) Xref: csiph.com talk.politics.misc:1157952 comp.os.linux.misc:57995 On Sat, 17 Aug 2024 22:01:12 -0400, "186282@ud0s4.net" <186283@ud0s4.net> wrote in : > https://www.dailymail.co.uk/yourmoney/taxes/article-13688929/IRS-worker- reveals-reasons-call-hold-tax-delays.html > > Decades-old computer systems 'paid for by the Kennedy administration' > and terrible management are the reasons for poor customer service at the > IRS, an insider has claimed. > > An IRS employee, who has worked at the agency for more than a decade, > has spoken exclusively to DailyMail.com about its failings, as it comes > under fire for long call wait times. > > The staffer, who has worked on the customer service and IT teams, said > that managers pursued 'vanity projects' instead of making changes which > would benefit workers and taxpayers. > > . . . > > Doesn't surprise me. > > Hmm ... what was good in the very early 60s ? > IBM had a number of offerings, esp it's new and great System/360. The > article did not specify WHAT 'ancient' computers. > > Of interest here is that such old tech DOES still WORK. Most of this > stuff was still discrete transistors in BIG boxes. > > Yea, yea, the modern stuff is 1000s of times faster and more compact. > I think a Raspberry Pi credit-card computer is a lot faster and more > capable. Modern stuff may not AS reliable however. > > However there's ANOTHER issue ... one guys I knew in the biz even yet > come across. It's the SOFTWARE. > > A lot of it was written in COBOL by those arrow-tie Dilberts LONG > ago. It's GREAT software - those square- > lookin' nerd guys were REALLY GOOD. > > But good software requires good MONEY ... and a lot of biz/govt > entities can't afford having the good old standards re-created for > modern hardware. Can barely afford (or find) people who can do little > patches on what is. > > So, they can't afford to, don't DARE to, replace that 60 year old > hardware and software. It works, so LEAVE IT ALONE. > > Heh ... I remember visiting a county facility when I was still pretty > young. The computer room was freezing and the floor was laser-leveled > for the benefit of the old-style disk drive units (and I mean > "units", you could physically remove a big spool of about 12" wide > disks - DO wait until they stop spinning !). There were also the > boxes with the spinning tapes and the obligatory card and paper-tape > readers. > > The "cpu chip" was about a cubic METER in size in the middle of the > room - DEC I think, PDP-4 or maybe PDP-7 - full of a bunch of circuit > boards with zillions of individual transistors and perhaps a few > early "chips". Workers/programmers had serial terminals at their > desks. > > Even then the machine was technically obsolete, > early PCs were already starting to come out, but again they could not > afford/dare to replace it. 50s/60s easy money had RUN OUT. > > BTW, if you're a COBOL guru you can make GOOD money these days > maintaining all that old software ... it's in Big Govt all the way > down to medium local biz. If you're so inclined to learn on your own...GNU has COBOL. COBC(1) User Commands COBC(1) NAME cobc - manual page for cobc 3.1.2.0 SYNOPSIS cobc [options]... file... DESCRIPTION GnuCOBOL compiler for most COBOL dialects with lots of extensions _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Our local community college used to have a COBOL class, as it led a software consortium that ran COBOL software on mainframes. Looks like they retired those old systems in 2009. -- -v