I am sorry to inform you that my second 3279 terminal died today - around
4  months after  its brother,  which died  sometime in  february of  this
year). Both terminals  were around 8 years old and  were obtained free of
charge from their previous owner;  they were, of course, unsupported, and
as you know 3279's generate a lot of heat and do not like to be subjected
to  excessive heat  themselves. These  2 3279's  were the  only terminals
hooked to SEARN.
 
Anyway, the bottom line is that I  no longer have decent access to SEARN;
I am typing this  note from a *painful* tn3270 session  on a *slow* ASCII
terminal. I had pointed out this risk to my management several months ago
and  they had  immediately  agreed to  purchase a  new  terminal for  me,
however because  of a small  "glitch" with the IBM  bean-counting service
(it would be long  to explain), we have not been able  to place the order
yet. Given that our  IBM rep is in vacations, as well as  most of our and
their administrative  service, and given  that IBM generally  considers 2
months to be a perfectly reasonable delivery delay for new terminals, the
situation  is very  unlikely to  improve within  the next  1-3 months.  I
regret  to say  that with  this quality  of access  to SEARN,  I am  very
unlikely to  do anything but  read and answer  mail (and this  is already
going to take me at least 3 times as much as it used to).
 
Trevlig sommar, Eric