also: as someone who works in software, this level of access simply should not exist for a system like this
every change to something like “the system that pays 1/5 of the economy” should have to go through multiple layers of review and approval, no one person should just have full admin access
every change to something like “the system that pays 1/5 of the economy” should have to go through multiple layers of review and approval, no one person should just have full admin access
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Oh wait, that’s movies. We’re talking about the irs here
Different agency, same secretary.
Every company has someone who’s managing the master system of record with all the financial data … even banks … usually some near-retirement mainframe programmer who’s been there 30 years and treats it like a pet
It's the equivalent of fixing you car with duct tape.
Most were built before modern ideas about fault tolerance were common. 🤷
But their age means that once someone has a high level of access there isn't much they can't do. 🤷
But yeah they only mention COBOL as a relic and the note that if you learn it, you can command a huge salary servicing legacy systems
Also I don't think it was a common part of a Computer Science degree even then.
They had enough trouble recruiting COBOL coders to deal with issues for Y2K, most we're approaching retiring age then. 🤷
I was wondering if they had ever even SEEN it, if they'd even know what they were looking at, lol.
I do know one COBOL programmer. He's about 80.
Given their competence or lack off, this is becoming a likely scenario. 🤷
The were written before modern software design methodologies were an idea in someone's head.
Just the idea of somebody exploring ISPF without a guide gives me the shivers. This is horrifying.
Talk about striking at the heart of the full faith and credit of the US government. 🤯
We used Halifax's current account system
In 1968 IBM hadn't finished CICS so Halifax went live with their own transaction system
Oh yes, we used that
(Not saying it isn't the norm, but it no longer needs to be the case.)
I say this as someone who does datacenter migrations etc.
He's what we used to call a "Near Expert User" - i.e. someone's who's confidence way exceeded their competence. 🤷