Re:U.S. Treasury seeks reporting of cryptocurrency transfers
by skissane on Friday May 21, 2021 @07:07AM
(#27232574)
> I don't remember the specifics, but I recall reading there's an actual IBM 7000 series mainframe still in government service. It has some kind of wrapper implemented to allow it to be called by more modern systems.
My understanding is some US government agency still has some apps written in 7074 assembly language. But it doesn't have a physical 7074 series mainframe, it uses a 7074 emulator which runs under z/OS on modern System z hardware.
That 7074 emulator isn't some secret sauce, it is actually just a very old IBM product. When IBM released the S/360 in the 1960s, they also released a 7074 emulator to help customers port their apps from 7074 to S/360. And this US government agency used that emulator to port some of their 7074 apps to S/360, and are still running the emulator on modern z/OS. It is probably no longer officially supported by IBM, but due to z/OS's excellent backward compatibility it still runs.
(The idea that the US government still has a physical 7074, as opposed to just an emulator for it, is in part due to US government employees who have spoken about this topic publicly being deliberately vague due to "security reasons".)
My understanding is some US government agency still has some apps written in 7074 assembly language. But it doesn't have a physical 7074 series mainframe, it uses a 7074 emulator which runs under z/OS on modern System z hardware.
That 7074 emulator isn't some secret sauce, it is actually just a very old IBM product. When IBM released the S/360 in the 1960s, they also released a 7074 emulator to help customers port their apps from 7074 to S/360. And this US government agency used that emulator to port some of their 7074 apps to S/360, and are still running the emulator on modern z/OS. It is probably no longer officially supported by IBM, but due to z/OS's excellent backward compatibility it still runs.
(The idea that the US government still has a physical 7074, as opposed to just an emulator for it, is in part due to US government employees who have spoken about this topic publicly being deliberately vague due to "security reasons".)