VMSHARE Archives

Search the VMSHARE Archives

About VMSHARE

VMSHARE has been the conferencing system of the VM Cluster of SHARE since August 1976. After VMSHARE was closed down in August 1998 it was decided that the database should be kept available for reference. Read here the announcement of that by Ross Patterson.
The best way to get a feeling for what VMSHARE meant to its users is probably by browsing through the VMSHARE Archives where you will find appends like this.
It may also be helpful to read Melinda Varian's History of VM to get a better understanding of the community that has developed around VM and VMSHARE.

Structure of VMSHARE

The discussions in VMSHARE were done by users appending to the conference files. Conference files were created when needed for discussion of a specific subject, the 8-character name picked to identify the subject. The subject of a conference file may be very broad (e.g. VMXA) or very specific (e.g. 4SP23).
Discussions are in MEMO and PROB files. The NOTE files are for longer appends (e.g. portions of code).

Searching

You can search the VMSHARE Archives on keywords (to select conference files that contain all keywords specified).

Alternatively you can select the conference files by name using the normal LISTFILE wildcard characters % and *.

Warning

Remember that most information on these pages really is old. Advise given here may not apply anymore to your situation or to the level of software you are running. Most phone numbers and (e-mail) addresses on these pages will not be valid anymore; many of the people contributing on VMSHARE will have changed jobs (some announced in MEMO MOVINGON).

Many of the people who used to live on VMSHARE can now be found on the VMESA-L mailing list (listserv@uafsysb.uark.edu). which has been moved to listserv.uark.edu, and the list has been renamed IBMVM. http://listserv.uark.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=ibmvm

From the Web Master

3270 All graphics and fancy layout on these pages is just my attempt to show that mainframe bigots can do graphics too. I hope you will still be able to read the content of the pages.
For many users, access to VMSHARE using 3270 fullscreen would have been a dream come through. Many never got further than 300 bps TeleType access or reading Melinda's Daily Distribution (or one of the several copies derived from those).

Please drop me a note when you find problems with the web site or when you have any other comments about the site.

Rob van der Heij rvdheij@iae.nl