Given that the last post on this blog was a bit more than 2 years ago it should not come as a surprise to anyone; I feel like I have sufficiently scratched the mainframe itch and have moved on to other projects. I have spent the last few months getting all my mainframe equipment into the hands of the next-generation of hobbyists and since a week or so I am now officially sans mainframe. This also means it feels a bit silly to operate a blog or an internet persona around supposedly doing things with mainframes, when I do not own one or participate in projects around them. Enjoy some parting images from the move. Image 1: Getting a mainframe down a ramp requires a lot of friends Image 2: Mainframe loaded and ready to move to its new home I have been thinking about possible other names to rebrand my shenanigans but nothing concrete yet. The current blog will remain here hosted on Blogger.com, for how long I guess time wil...
Yesterday after more than a year's delay my zBC12 mainframe finally booted up. This is a machine that was donated to me in hopes to advance the hobbyist community, which I am eternally grateful for. Image 1: Athena, the zBC12 that just now got online Then what is the main selling point of the zBC12 versus the z114? You might recall my article System z on contemporary zLinux where I explained that running modern Linux on a z114 is hard. This is the main selling point for me to upgrade - being able to run things like more modern Linuxes than z114. While the latest OSes in zLinux, z/VM, and z/OS require z13 or newer - a zBC12 still allows me to run a few releases newer software. Image 2: The operator himself in the picture with Athena Perhaps one of the bigger deals that is very welcome is the support for OSA-Express5S. This means that while previously you needed both PCIe and I/O bays in order to have both effective higher speed connectivity like 8G FC or 10 GB Ethernet as wel...