RSS Notes for the New YearBy Dr.Karl Ho, Research and Statistical Support Services ManagerWelcome to the year of Rabbit! Beginning this semester, we plan to provide Research and Statistical Support (RSS) news and information to you as often as possible. Benchmarks Online will be our main venue to channel our communications. Also, Craig Henderson will administer a LISTSERV list to disseminate RSS news via E-mail. We will try to provide news, via RSS LISTSERV like updates of software, bug fixes, and special workshops as frequently as it is needed. To subscribe, send E-mail to listserv@unt.edu and put the following in the body: subs unt-rss YOURFIRSTNAME YOURLASTNAME For more details or to subscribe via your Web browser, visit: How to Subscribe to the RSS LISTSERV List (http://www.unt.edu/rss/listserv.htm) Important Year 2000 InformationYes, we do address the hottest issue of the year here in RSS. How much will the Y2k problem affect your research projects at UNT? Will your data be lost or altered on the first day of the millenium? Softwarewise, I think we are basically fine. All of the RSS-supported software is either already Y2k compliant or has been upgraded to a new version that covers possible Y2k-related problems. A brief list of compliance reports that we prepared as a Computing Center-wide project last year is attached. With regard to operating systems, UNIX does not have the problem until 2048, or may not have it at all by then. As far as other desktop OS's go, Windows 95 and 98 are designed with Y2k compliance in their architecture, so is MacOS 8.5. In fact, all Macs are Y2K compliant.* UNT mainframe OS's, according to Mr. Coy Hoggard**, UNT's Year 2000 Compliance Officer, VM/CMS and OS/MVS are also ready for the millenium. However, we have to exercise caution in dealing with some of our supported software on the Academic Mainframe: SPSS 4.1 on CMS and SPSS 4 on OS/MVS. Since SPSS Inc. has stated its policy of discontinuing development of mainframe versions of SPSS, we are not fully confident that it is the best choice to stay with the software beyond the year 2000. For this reason, we are helping faculty members and researchers migrate to other versions of the software, such as SPSS 6.1 for UNIX and the upcoming SPSS 9.0 for Windows. Granted, the current mainframe versions of the software will be supported until the year 2000 and we will monitor closely the compliance of this software. However, we recommend that researchers take advantage of the cutting edge technology and hardware in the UNIX environment. At present, we have SPSS, SAS, S-Plus, Mathematica and sundry other applications on sol (sol.acs.unt.edu), our Research UNIX system. Other advantages of the UNT UNIX systems include:
If you are interested in moving from CMS or MVS to UNIX, please contact directly Rich Herrington (x2140 or richherr@unt.edu), who specializes in RSS UNIX applications. Rich is also knowledgeable in UNIX operations and statistical applications. Acquire your Statistical Software for the new semesterIf you need a comprehensive statistical package for the new semester, check out the SAS Student version at the UNT Bookstore. The $40 CD covers the full version of SAS 6.12 plus a new add-on module, SAS/Analyst, that provides access to statistical analysis via a point-and-click approach. However, the CD is confined for student purchase only. Be sure to check with us for the latest edition of SAS/Analyst, which comes free with the SAS software. Direct any questions on the SAS student version CD or software support to Craig Henderson (x2140 or craigh@unt.edu) or drop by the Research and Statistical Support Office at ISB 131. * See Don't Change that Date, Benchmarks Online, October 1998. ** Coy wrote a very detailed article on the Year 2000 problem for the September 1998 Benchmarks Online. Year 2000 Compliance of RSS Supported Software
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