General Comments
General Comments
by Other Users
of Jol
"There is no doubt that Jol is one of the most efficient and innovative products in the software market today, with significant advantages over IBM's product."
"Its credibility has been established beyond doubt by its implementation by some of the biggest Users in the business."
"Jol is written in a simple, freeform language which allows trainee programmers to write accurate commands within a day or so. So retraining is minimal."
"We just don't know how we got along without it."
"Most installation processing tends to be complex in time and therefore more volatile in operational terms. Jol would allow a more flexible approach to be taken to User needs."
"My reaction to this package is that it is excellent and may fulfill a void now present in the lack of expertise in IBM Job Control."
"We believe Jol to be an excellent package which has substantial cost benefits."
"Jol is a viable product that meets all its design features."
"The compiler generates near optimum JCL under all conditions, using a flexible source language which is much easier to learn and use than JCL."
"The run-time overheads of the monitor (storage, CPU-time, I/O) will often be offset by the greater efficiency of the generated JCL and decreased incidence of JCL errors."
"Jol should appeal to three categories of user:-
1- The `first-time' OS user who has come from another machine or is upgrading from DOS. Jol is easily understood and will enable him to get major development and productions systems live that much quicker and more efficently.
2- The small OS user who is growing. Smaller installations often cannot afford the luxury of full-time JCL experts and rely on programmers and operators to develop and maintain JCL procedures.
3- The `big' OS user who is getting bigger. Some of the above comments are equally true, although the user may not admit it! With an established in-house JCL and systems programming capability the big user can take advantage of Jol's extensions and exits to improve the quality of his operation. At the same time the handover of systems from development programmers to maintenance and production teams can be greatly smoothed by the use of libraries of Jol definitive statements.
For Conversions
General Comments by Users Who Have Used Jol for Conversions
"... It was recognized from the beginning of the project that implementing Job Control Language procedures for the IBM computer would be the most time consuming task and the one most likely to prevent the deadline being achieved".
"... IBM JCL is complex in its format and a programmer requires a considerable degree of experience before competent job control language decks can be written. The conversion team did not have the experience and because of the deadline did not have time to develop the level of experience needed."
"... A one day course was given to the conversion team."
"... Jol was found to be an easy-to-use programming language."
"... The ratio between a Jol statement and JCL code is of the order of one to three."
"... The Jol claim that `the software substantially reduces the incidence of job control language errors' was substantiated in the conversion exercise. Job failures due to JCL coding errors are a feature of most installations during the development phase."
"... The validation procedures used by Jol are oriented towards the total job - the whole job is checked out at compile time. This is a significant advantage over conventional JCL where a job can fail at each individual step within a procedure, because of a control language failure."
"... The net effect was a substantial saving in machine time because JCL errors were detected in the first run of the system, and, therefore, the several re-runs to clear JCL errors were not required."
"... Jol provides additional benefits with regard to restarts. Restart points are easier to code in Jol."
"... Significant benefits are identified in terms of programmer productivity and machine utilization during the system testing phase."
"... The Jol package made a significant contribution to the success of the conversion project."
"... found Jol to be efficient reliable software with very real benefits in terms of Programmer Productivity and Machine Utilization. Without the Jol software the conversion deadline would not have been achieved, and this would have created very severe problems for the industry. Therefore, in the situation where large systems needed the capability of being transferred to different installations, Jol is recommended as a very powerful tool to aid this type of work."
Mining
Paul White
Manager/Computer Processing
Group Computer Services
Conzinc Riotinto/Australia Ltd.
Cost Avoidance/Reductions
"Takes less time to write than conventional JCL, hence saving on labor costs.
"Ability to structure code and the use of full screen plus condition statements means that it is easier to write, test, maintain and modify compared to JCL.
"Portability - can run on MVS, F4, X8.
"Ability to serve as a means of data capture with basic debugging and error messages."
Maintenance Programming
"Jol is simpler and easier to read, due to the structuring of code. For example, with Jol we can readily identify what files are being passed between programs and what is the actual sequence of programs."
Development Programming
"Has simple instructions for commonly used utilities (copy, sort, etc.) Easier and clearer to write due to its ability to be structured. Can be used as a form of on-line data capture with debugging, including output of error messages to the screen.
"Terminal I/O has full screen capability.
"Logic can be built up into single modules with the ability to communicate between modules.
"Conditional job execution, etc. is much easier with the IF/ELSE statement."
Data Center Operations
"Run instructions and options can be contained within Jol and displayed on the screen.
"Provides the user with the ability to execute his own run streams, hence reducing operations workload."
End User Support
"Flexibility of Jol in respect to conditional statements and screen formatting features allows for greater user friendliness than CLISTS/JCL.
"Allows for more automated system execution, thus reducing the reliance on EDP staff in support."
Reruns/Restarts
"Reruns/restarts can be incorporated into one module thereby reducing need to change code.
"Restarts are simplified by one instruction indicating which step to restart from."
Retailing
Werner Zimmerman
Executive Director
Myer Information Services
Development
"We have found Jol to be a powerful tool capable of replacing TSO CLISTS and JCL catalogued procedures. Its use of symbolics is particularly effective."
Maintenance
"By using Jol as the means of producing job control, we have improved upon the reliability and efficiency of our batch applications."
Data Center Operations
"Jol has proved itself to be an effective method of writing production standard job control.
"The transition to the use of Jol in place of JCL jobs submitted via TSO CLISTS has been virtually transparent to the operations schedulers."
Training
"Jol is very easy to teach programmers and operators alike, although we have found that each group requires a different emphasis in training. A little resistance to Jol comes from programmers who have learned JCL in the past. Some programmers have gained a good working knowledge of Jol without requiring any formal education."
Cost Avoidance/Reductions
"The number of lines of Jol code is usually in the vicinity of 1/2 to 2/3 of the quantity of JCL and CLISTS.
"The time and effort required to code job control has been reduced nearly 50%."
Reruns/Restarts
"Condition code testing in Jol is much easier and simpler than in JCL."
Railways
Rex McConchie,
Manager,
Victorian Railways
"We have chosen Jol for job control as part of a project of improved security and job control. The simplicity and productivity gains we hope to obtain represent the reason for adopting Jol."
Airlines
Eric Smitton,
Manager/Compuer Services,
Air New Zealand
Programming
(Development/Maintenance)
"We have found Jol simple, easy to use and debug, resulting in time savings. Jol is readily learned by programming staff."
Data Center
"With Jol, fewer operational problems are encountered resulting in fewer reruns and greater overall reliability. Additionally, less operator intervention is required with consequent manpower savings and faster throughput."
Government
Eric Mobbs,
Software Services Section,
Australian Bureau of Statistics,
Canberra.
"Development work in the last 3 years has been almost exclusively on the M200 machine with many large systems being redeveloped for the new environment. All application systems, of which there are in excess of 100, have been developed without the use of JCL. All batch processing is controlled by the application user for whom development programmers have generally provided Jol commands in the form of an application monitor.
"The Bureau of Statistics has developed the use of Jol commands (MACROS), using the full screen panel entensively, so that there is a `friendly interface' between the end user and the processing system. This has been necessary to provide non-programmers with full capability to drive complex statistical processing systems. Combinations of Jol commands which lead the user through the options, subsystems, and restart capabilities of the application system provide a capability otherwise unavailable without specialist JCL programmers constructing the needs of each particular user at each stage.
"In the area of generalized software packages, including both ABS developed and commercially available software, the ABS has produced Jol commands to drive these packages in a simplified way, often with enhanced functionality built into Jol. The number of commands written for these packages is increasing rapidly with the building of the statistical processing environment."
"The use of Jol has provided a simplified maintenance for systems which depend on its use. Being a simple and readable programming language without the complexity of JCL, code is easily maintainable by relatively inexperienced programmers and by many personnel whose main occupation has never been computer programming.
"Cost savings to the organization have been in training, development, and maintenance. Development time of the job for an application system is considerably less than would have been required if using JCL, and the total functionality of JCL would fall far short of the usual functionality achieved using Jol."
"In summary, the ABS is fully committed to the use of Jol for all job submissions other than those which are for maintenance of the installation software such as the operating system and major aquired software such as ADABAS. Currently, some 70,000 batch jobs per month are run under the control of Jol. Many of these are either chained or networked together. New releases of the Jol software have occurred in each of the last three years and each has had increased capabilities that have rapidly become widely used in the ABS systems."
Petroleum
Mobil Oil
AUSTRALIA
"Jol provides features which give operations the ability to prepare `watertight' production application procedures for use during batch processing. Panelling and Jol's error detection capability provides the scheduler with the facility to schedule error-free work."
Service Bureau
George Oros,
Manager,
Computer Center,
ATAC. Pty. Ltd.
Programming
"Due to Jol's flexibility and powerful commands, the once dreaded JCL writing in the programming department has become a thing of the past. The testing stage of any project is greatly accelerated."
Data Center
"Reruns due to Operator/JCL Errors have virtually been eliminated and when they are necessary, Jol allows for very easy reruns or restarts from any step. No longer do we need multiple jobstreams. With one jobstream, we can run daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly procedures."
"The best piece of software I have come across in my 15 years in EDP."