@SteveBellovin
We're getting points for #REXX now? It's not like he dropped Exec2 or something.
@oclsc

A while ago I tooted about languages such as #rexx and #ooRexx getting the "Hitchhiker's number" 2**276709 correct out of the box. That agrees with the Kindle book. Must dig out the paperback.

Now I've just played the radio shows from the boxed set of CDs (of series 1 to 5) and it says 2**267709 instead.

I'll play the 3 CDs of the version re-recorded for vinyl next, but the question is "How many versions of #h2g2 are there?"

I'd just like to point out that some languages (such as Rexx and ooRexx) calculate the Hitchhiker's Number (2**276709) correctly out of the box.

/* Rexx */
numeric digits 100000
h2 = 2**276709
say length(h2) "digits"
say left(h2,12) "(starts with)"
say right(h2,12) "(ends)"

Confession: I haven't checked all 83,298 digits, but the beginning and end look correct, along with the total count of digits.

This has been a PSA :-)

#rexx #mainframe #scripting

@tumble And @matty occasionally posts about #PowerShell.

I can recommend learning PowerShell. You'll look back at CMD scripting and ask yourself why on Earth you enjoyed hammering the square peg into the round hole for all of those years.

I had a similar experience many years ago after learning #REXX.

@lodurel this could take a while
CBM #Basic V2 1981
BBC Basic 1983
6502 #assembler 1984
#FaSTBasic 1987
#GfABasic 1987
#4DOS Batch 1989
#Rexx 1993
#Awk 1994
#C 1995
#CMinusMinus 1995
#Perl 1998
#PostScript 2001
#Rust 2018
#Raku 2019
#Python 2020
#Ruby 2020
#Kotlin 2021
#Lua 2021
#JavaScript 2022

Everything from Perl onwards still sees frequent use. Awk one-liners, but not serious programs. C-- was wonderful, a sort of C-like autocoder for DOS where you'd drop into assembler for the hard bits, which compiled to tiny .com files.

These days my first choice is Rust but I'm still getting competent at that so I may fall back to Perl for something quick.

I know just enough bash to see where the footguns are and write in a different language instead.

https://blog.firedrake.org/archive/2022/01/Polyglot_Programming.html

So #REXX + #MQTT + #Linux + #Git gives me the chance of version control the PDS datasets and members from ISPF 😀

Inspired by @smallsco #macstodon I present to you BREXXtodon an MVS 3.8j mastodon viewer!

https://github.com/mainframed/BREXXTODON

#rexx #mainframe #mvs

If you use MVS 3.8j with BREXX I converted all the documentation to restructuredtext for them and placed the documentation on readthedocs: https://brexx370.readthedocs.io/en/latest/index.html

Makes it so much easier to look up functions.

#rexx #brexx #rexx #mvs #mainframe

Just working on something for MVS 3.8j. The final interface will be full screen like ispf but this POC proves its possible

#mainframe #mastodon #mvs #retrocomputing #rexx #tso

The #ANSI #REXX specification states that resources can become exhausted at any time and thus an interpreter could at any time report that resources have been exhausted and halt.

It goes on to say that, therefore, an interpreter that does nothing but report resource exhaustion and half would be conforming with the specification.

It does, however, say that such an implementation would “not be in keeping with the spirit of this specification.”

Open Object Rexx announces ooRexx 5.0.0 General Availability!

https://www.rexxla.org/news/announce-ooRexx-5.0.html

ooRexx is an object oriented extension to the classic Rexx programming language (but backwards compatible with classic syntax). Rexx provides a full featured programming language but can also seamlessly run operating system commands, making it a nice alternative to sh/bat

#rexx #scripting

There is an exciting little project. Unfortunately, I currently lack the time to actively participate there. In any case, it is worth a look.

https://github.com/adesutherland/CREXX

#rexx

#retrocomputing #amiga #rexx #arexx The ARexx manual that came with my Amiga 4000. ARexx was based on IBM's Rexx; a brilliant language in it's own right, it came into its own on the Amiga as a way of orchestrating interactions between different programs. For example telling a 3d renderer to produce frames for an animation and then telling another program to create an anim8 file from the frames.

@berge
@eyvind
Svadageneratoren var opprinnelig skrevet i #Fortran for #Nord-10 tror jeg. Rexx-versjonen var en sterkt omarbeidet porting av det. #Rexx #svada

@eyvind
@berge
Åhh, Rexx-interpreteren #Regina og svadageneratoren i #Rexx må jeg nok vedkjenne meg, ja. Den pleide å ligge på nett, men forsvant i en opprydning, jeg må lete den frem igjen. #svada

@danslerush I still use #Rexx for various jobs on the home network.

Right now Regina Rexx is searching for bitrot by hashing a random selection of files from laptop, Google cloud space ('mounting' it as a Windows drive using fstream.exe), and one of the external backup drives I usually keep in my 'smalls' drawer :-)

I'll rewrite it in C# one day, maybe. Probably if/when Rexx lets me down.

I found an article titled “Top 8 reasons for using Python instead of REXX“ which was an interesting read to me https://medium.com/theropod/top-8-reasons-for-using-python-instead-of-rexx-for-z-os-a6b67f8210a6 #mainframe #rexx #python

Looking through this collection, it looks like you can use at least the following programming languages to write programs in #DOS :
#C #rexx #prolog #asm #ada #basic (several BASIC dialects, some compiled even) #forth #Cpp #pascal #modula2 #lisp #smalltalk #fortran #cobol #logo #perl #python

I forgot to do an #introductions post with hashtags, so here goes.

Professionally, #zos #rexx #python #ibm are interesting to me, though I don’t post much on those topics.

Otherwise, I look for #StarWars #StarTrek #DoctorWho #WritingFiction #LOTR #Tolkien #astronomy #space and the like.

I also watch a lot of #Kdrama and am studying #Korean. Hope to visit some day.

I forgot to do an #introductions post with hashtags, so here goes.

Professionally, #zos #rexx #python #ibm are interesting to me, though I don’t post much on those topics.

Otherwise, I look for #StarWars #StarTrek #DoctorWho #WritingFiction #LOTR #Tolkien #astronomy #space and the like.

I also watch a lot of #Kdrama and am studying #Korean. Hope to visit some day.