EXEC I/O

In an New York Times article of March 28^th, the words of Steward Alsop, who predicted that the last mainframe would be unplugged in 1996 were put in context.

The mainframe was use as one example how “old” technology proved to be a strong survivor together with Radio, railways and the most modern one, print media. All these “old” technologies were supposed to be replaced by new ones like television, cars & trucks and the Web respectively.

One of the conclusions is that, to survive, these “old” technologies all have some sort of enduring advantage that is not replaced by its “successor”. And for the mainframe, this typically was the rock-solid stability and security to run vital transactions, while at the same time it allowed companies to integrate “new technology” like the Web & SOA transactions.

The most important conclusion was that the business decisions matter most. People tend to overestimate the importance of technological innovation and underestimate the role of business judgment. “The rise and fall of technologies is mainly about business and not technological determinism”.

Too often, we allow ourselves to get overexcited about new technology, and so do our clients. As a software vendor, it is our responsibility to talk about that. With more than 30 years of experience, we need to demonstrate that we understand that it IS about the business. That is what sets CA apart as a company. We lived through the “near death experience” of the mainframe and we have seen the revival. We all understand why this happened, but we need to talk about it with our clients. Share our experience, talk business and become the advisor our clients expect us to be.

Like many, you are probably convinced that dinosaurs were wiped out long ago. The "new" climate better suited mammals, right? But smaller dino's adapted and survived and today, more than 8,000 species of reptiles still exist, compared to about 5,400 species of mammals...

Like many, some of you are still convinced that the IBM mainframe is in it's final days. But today, 90% of the Fortune 500 still runs their most important transactions on an IBM mainframe, using CA software to Manage & Secure it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/23/technology/23digi.html?_r=2&scp=2&sq=mainframe&st=nyt&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

"Housework is something nobody notices unless you don't do it."

"The squeaky wheel gets the grease."

"Out of sight, out of mind."

What do all of these quotes have to do with the mainframe? Two words: It works.

Who'd have ever thought that would be a problem?

Just think: over four decades of building and refining the ultimate business machine, and very few people seem to know or care that it even exists, let alone that it's still effectively running the world economy.

After all, 70% of organizations and governments are still running critical applications on the mainframe per the Butler Group (see http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=196900665).

That's a pretty spectacular number for a machine that doesn't appear to exist.

The funny thing is, it actually could have been argued to be a good strategy to keep the mainframe out of sight - less threat of being a target, given how important it is.

The only problem is, the strategy (if that's what it was) worked so well that the management of many organizations that rely on mainframes don't seem to realize its importance either.

And that's a problem - after all, the cost of the mainframe can seem quite large when its value is not apparent.

Fortunately, some of the largest organizations on earth seem to have recognized the value of their mainframes and increased their commitment to this platform in a very big way. That would certainly explain its spectacular growth over the past decade.

But what about the rest of the mainframe world - those organizations that haven't "seen the light"? Often, they've curtailed investment in this "goose that lays the golden egg" and even tried to move to narrower platforms for the sake of perceived savings.

I think the time has come to wake them up. In fact, if the management of an organization doesn't see the value of their mainframe, they don't have the information necessary to run their businesses properly.

So, the question is: who's going to do it?

The answer? Us! You and me. It's time for us to stop being apologetic about the mainframe and stand up and let people know how important and valuable it is - and particularly people who ought to know in order to do their jobs properly.

So, my question for you is: what can you do to help your management appreciate the critical importance of your mainframe to your organization's success?

I look forward to your thoughts!

Well, it's been about a week and a half since I returned home from SHARE in Orlando, Florida, and I think I've recovered enough to collect my thoughts and impressions.

And my first thought on the matter is: SHARE is one very important mainframe user community and conference!

It's interesting to think about the fact that SHARE was actually founded in 1955, nine years before the IBM System/360 mainframe was born (on April 7, 1964). Originally, it was a community of business computer users for whom this was a forum to SHARE information (it's not an acronym; as I understand it, it's all uppercase because their computers only used uppercase at the time). And one kind of information they shared was suggestions about how to improve business computers, which they told to IBM.

That would suggest that SHARE actually influenced the development of the IBM mainframe.

In any case, since 1964, SHARE has become focused mainly on supporting users of this platform. In fact, it's a central part of what might be called the mainframe community, or even ecosystem.

That's important. Just like the mainframe is no longer an island in the world of enterprise IT, it's also important that individual mainframe-using organizations and technologists not be isolated from others who use the same technologies.

So, what did I do at the SHARE conference? First, I learned, attending a good number of educational sessions that allowed me to increase my general awareness of issues, technologies and approaches in various mainframe contexts. There are educational sessions from Sunday afternoon through Friday morning.

Of course, someone has to present these sessions. Since SHARE is a volunteer-run organization, that means it's up to each of us as attendees to consider whether we have something to offer that would be of value to others. In my case, I gave a couple of presentations on ITIL and then supported a few more based around the zNextGen project for people who are new to the mainframe or have a new role on that platform.

Another thing I did at SHARE was participate as a member of the community. For me, that meant being involved with two of the projects at SHARE (projects are subject-area focused parts of programs, which are based around larger subject areas, and which are the essential constituent organizations of SHARE). One was the Security and Auditing project, and the other was zNextGen. In addition, there were various opportunities for networking with other mainframers, including at the evening receptions.

The next SHARE will be held August 10-15 in San Jose, California, and I'm planning to be there too, presenting, learning and supporting the ecosystem.

Great, but why is this all so important? Because, at the end of the day, business computing (including mainframes) is all about business, and business is all about people, and people need to meet with, socialize with and learn from other people in order to make the world of business and computing turn. So, as we all return from this conference and bring everything we learned back to our jobs, we understand more, do better work, and advance the cause of responsible enterprise-wide business computing.

By the way, while SHARE is a very important organization that holds a regular mainframe-relevant conference, it's not the only one. There are similar organizations elsewhere in the world, and companies such as CA also have such conferences. Our next one is CA World, which will be held at The Venetian Congress and Sands Expo Convention Center in Las Vegas, Nevada November 16 - 20, 2008. And believe me, we're going to have some great mainframe content there as well!

To find out more about SHARE, you can visit http://share.org/

To find out more about zNextGen, see http://znextgen.org/

And, to find out more about CA World, see http://caworld.com/

I hope to see you at one or more of these!

Greetings from SHARE! It's been a great week here in Orlando, meeting other mainframers, learning new and interesting things, and finding out about the latest and neatest in technology.

I'll plan to talk more about SHARE in a future blog, but I had to share this insight with you now rather than waiting until I returned home.

And that is: the mainframe is green!

I know: you probably already knew that the mainframe has a much smaller footprint than any other platform for large business workloads in terms of space, power and cooling requirements.

And, you likely are aware that the incremental cost of adding new workloads to a given mainframe is tiny compared to buying more computers for new distributed workload.

But IBM really put the icing on the cake at SHARE when they announced their new z10 EC mainframe (see http://www-01.ibm.com/common/ssi/cgi-bin/ssialias?subtype=ca&infotype=an&appname=iSource&supplier=897&letternum=ENUS108-154). While the box is still a dignified yet cool shade of black, its colored stripe is now - you guessed it - green!

Why is this important? Because it's a constant reminder of one of the most important emergent issues in the world of business IT, along with a solution par excellence for this matter.

So, the next time you hear someone complaining about the high environmental cost of business computing, you can tell them, "The Mainframe is Green!"

Imagine, if you will, a luxury sports sedan with a V8 engine, plus an extra row of cylinders, designed especially for long-distance driving, that used almost no fuel.

When driving around town, or accelerating out of a traffic light, or performing other day-to-day tasks, you'd use the V8 and expect normal fuel economy.

But when departing for long business trips or vacations, once you hit the highway the special cylinders would kick in, and you would begin to run almost indefinitely before having to stop for gas.

Now, imagine that this extra row of cylinders was a relatively inexpensive add-on option for your car.

Who wouldn't buy it?

As far as I can figure, that seems to be the idea behind IBM's specialty mainframe engines such as the zIIP (z9 Integrated Information Processor) and zAAP (System z Application Assist Processor). You plug ‘em in, and suddenly, specialized workloads begin to run almost "free" in terms of software-billable CPU time. And as a result, according to IBM, zIIP and zAAP growth is accelerating, with a 110% YTY increase in adoption.

Of course, if such a car engine existed and began to get market buy-in, it would make sense that people's driving habits might start to favor those roadways for which this engine was built. Which would likely lead to the opening of more roadways for this specialty use.

Likewise, some pretty cool things are beginning to happen in this new zIIP-and-zAAP-enabled mainframe world.

I know this because I work for an ISV that has begun to configure some popular "software roadways" to be eligible for these cost-saving engines.

In fact, while there's a whole range of our mainframe software from network, database, resource and performance management to databases that will employ and/or monitor these engines, one of the coolest things we're doing is creating software appliances that use this virtual cost-savings mechanisms.

That's right: software appliances using specialty engines to avoid the costs and limitations of traditional approaches.

According to my mainframe storage colleagues, that's what we're now doing with virtual tape drives and tape encryption. Instead of hardware lock-in on the one hand, or high CPU charges on the other, CA Vtape and CA Tape Encryption are running as virtual as you can get. You might even call it virtue-al.

So I'm thinking, what will they think of next? Will IBM introduce another engine that makes software even cheaper on the mainframe? Will ISV's such as CA introduce more software ways to virtualize our customers' mainframe costs with even more innovative uses for this technology? Or will some even newer virtue be found to benefit the mainframe world?

What do you think will happen next?

For the past few years, and over the next decade, we're hearing about the retirement of the Baby Boomers, and in the world of mainframes, the even more imminent retirement of the majority of the mainframe technical workforce.

In both cases, right now it feels pretty theoretical - the impact has not yet begun to be seriously felt. In fact, in the case of the Baby Boomers, it may be another decade at least before things get really challenging.

However, in the world of mainframes, we are already starting to see the beginning signs of this wave. It would be even more obvious except for the fact that mainframes are getting more and more manageable while those remaining people, who haven't retired or departed for other reasons, are becoming increasingly expert and able.

If this were only about a problem, however, I could stop here. Fortunately, this blog entry is actually about good news: there's a new generation beginning to emerge to "take the reins" from the current generation of mainframers as they move to retirement, management and other pursuits that are non-mainframe and/or non-technical.

How do I know this? Because I've had the pleasure of being involved in some of the initiatives that support the development of this new cohort. And, I'd like to tell you about a few of them.

The first one is called "zNextGen" and it's a project in the SHARE mainframe user community. Now, if you're a mainframer, you're probably familiar with SHARE - it's a mainframe user-focused organization that holds conferences twice a year, and the educational sessions are offered by various programs, which are divided into projects.

Well, back in February of 2005 when SHARE met in Anaheim, California, I had the pleasure of giving a presentation on behalf of CA about the importance of what we called "Mainframe Continuity Planning."  Within a year of that, a new SHARE project had sprung up whose goal was to support and nurture the development of a new generation of mainframers, and it was named "zNextGen". Today, it is a growing and going concern, led by a young mainframer named Kristine Harper who has her own blog, in which she writes about the experience of being a mainframe newbie (see http://www.neonesoft.com/blog/blogs/kharper/default.aspx).

CA is supporting the development of this new generation of mainframers in a number of ways, beginning in our own back yard. After all, some of our best mainframe technologists are also getting pretty experienced, so we've been investing in the building of a new generation of mainframe development and support personnel, including some university training for them and a new mainframe "Center of Excellence" in Prague.

Of course, every other mainframe-using organization will also need a new generation, so CA's Academic Initiative has been busy building our relationships with and support of universities and colleges that offer mainframe education, so they can also teach their students about CA's mainframe software.

Still, at the end of the day, what counts is getting this new generation on-the-job and productive as quickly as possible, and that's where CA brings a spectacular and proven advantage, with software, education and services to enable new mainframers to quickly and easily learn and undertake their responsibilities.

For example, one of the challenges for a new mainframer (especially one that grew up with point-and-click and GUIs) to get used to is the 3270 way of thinking. Why are PF7 and PF8 often up and down? Why is scrolling done using program function keys instead of in a local window? And why is it necessary to hit the "Reset" key?

That's why CA is offering graphical interfaces to our mainframe, and enterprise-wide, management products, from workload automation to network management to our Vantage GMI which gives a common interface to many of our mainframe solutions as well as our distributed Storage Resource Management

Another important way we're helping a new generation is with our installation and maintenance, which we're constantly working to make easier. One example of this is our CAMPUS support offering, which brings all the CA mainframe products you select on a single tape, at current maintenance levels for which they've been tested to run concurrently on a live system. As a result, a single, simple RECEIVE-APPLY-ACCEPT cycle is all that's needed to get your CA mainframe software current - and we even offer a menu interface to make it simpler.

In any case, what it all comes down to is that a new generation is dawning on the mainframe, and we're welcoming it with open arms.

So, the question is: what is your organization doing? Is the average mainframer at your shop closer to 55 or 25 years old? If you're like most organizations, the answer is probably 55, in which case it's time to start planning for the future, so you don't lose all your expertise when your best people begin retiring - which they probably have already begun to do.

And, by the way, what does your management think of this? Because if they believe they can just move off the mainframe and onto another platform in a matter of weeks or months once the last mainframer retires, they're in for a big surprise. As one of CA's customers told us about their key CA IDMS mainframe database, "We started sunsetting this system so long ago, the sun's rising again!" In other words, the logical conclusion of most organizations' efforts to move off the mainframe is to rediscover the value for which they moved onto it in the first place!

What do you think? I've already had one interesting comment on this topic on a previous blog entry. Join in: what are you and your organization doing to make sure your central computing environment doesn't accidentally "go unsupported" in a couple of years? What should you (and/or other organizations) be doing?

And what more would you like CA to be doing to support you?

I look forward to your comments!

Every so often, a performing artist comes along and takes the world by storm after years of obscurity. We often joke about such a person that they "took decades to become an overnight success."

How does this happen? Personally, I think it's a combination of quality and maturity - kind of like a fine red wine that reaches its peak as it ages - or like the mainframe.

After all, the mainframe is also (once again) becoming a platform of choice for business computing. While it has been around for 43 years, it has continuously evolved, and the business world is now reawakening to mainframe qualities of service and reevaluating total costs such as support personnel and power. As a result, it's beginning to look like an overnight success.

Similarly, CA has also grown up. Over the past 31 years, we've made (and acquired) a wide variety of mainframe management products, development tools and databases which help run the world's largest businesses day in and day out. We've established a place in the history of mainframe computing as the #1 ISV, and we take this role and responsibility seriously. Today, we want to ensure that our customers are getting full value from their mainframe and our products by using all the features, functions and options for which they are licensed.

That's Valued Today - the first half of our mainframe strategy that we've just begun to tell the world about.

Now, we're building on that theme to enable our customers to move forward with enterprise-wide IT management, particularly including the mainframe, to meet the business requirements and opportunities of tomorrow. In fact, Chris O'Malley, general manager of our mainframe business unit, has announced a five year plan to prove that we're moving forward with our mainframe customers and solutions, and not looking back. That's Essential Tomorrow.

Of course, this blog isn't the right place to tell you everything we are committing to - if you want to see more about that, you should visit http://ca.com/mainframe and follow the links to our Mainframe Solution Strategy brief.

However, what I will tell you is that I'm as optimistic as I've ever been about the future of the mainframe and CA. It's true that we've been through some rough patches together. And, if you've been a CA customer for a while, maybe you haven't seen as much emphasis on the mainframe as you would have liked.

Well, the good news is: all this time, we've been quietly chugging along, aging like fine wine, prepared to be a part of this mainframe ecosystem becoming an overnight success. And the time has come for us, as mainframers, as organizations that use mainframes, and here at CA, to show our stuff.

So, welcome to a new day of value, with the bright future essential for business IT success!

I look forward to your comments!

The history of computing is well-documented, as is the is age old adage that those who forget the mistakes of history are destined to repeat them.

Computing as a tool to enable a business to manage vast numbers of transactions, (some complex, some simple, always incredibly repetitive and absolutely consistently) is one of the most fundamental functions of computing in business, science, commerce, creativity - in fact, everywhere. Being able to think of new ways of delivering information, services or products has become key to business fitness. Making a change to a complex system quickly is of course a double-edged sword, the full impacts of change need to be assessed, tested and considered before they can be implemented.

The philosophy of delivering rock solid reliability demands incredibly robust processes that drive down to the raw physics and chemistry of an environment to build stable foundations designed to exceed a very clearly defined set of needs. Look at the process of building a large skyscraper, large airplane or really any huge machine. Every element has to be considered to ensure the whole system will work flawlessly for the whole of its designed life and (hopefully beyond).

This same level of engineering control is followed by the engineering team that implements and runs all the changeable systems in these large machines. A skyscraper is continually being reconfigured as different businesses move in, move out, staffing levels change, usage changes etc, but all the subsystems for power, lighting, air, elevators, telecoms, security, fire control, interior design etc. are designed to deliver 100% reliably in this environment of continuous change.

Imagine a building, which didn’t follow these rules! Imagine having for example an open plot of land where different buildings could be quickly built to meet short term goals, where each building on the plot could make their own decisions on security, fire prevention, telecoms , interconnection etc. It would be a fun place to work (at least initially), but keeping control would be a lot more complex, and the likelihood of a problem would be much greater. Places just like this do exist, and they work well for smaller businesses, where higher levels of risk can be taken because the impact of failure is less critical.

I believe this analogy maps well to the world of computing. Windows, and Unix environments allow for quick implementations but by their very nature they assume that all the processes will be used by all applications and all users, and it's up to the implementation and maintenance teams to lock everything down, and consider each and every interconnect to each and every system. Of course there are great tools available to help with the process. But you start from a position of vulnerability and have to be very careful to consider every possible event and condition. In this ecosystem we have seen the development of a whole industry of people who love to discover and exploit vulnerabilities using ever more creative and complex methods.

The mainframe conversely is architected (like the skyscraper) with integrated subsystems in place that assume that by default every application and every user has no rights to any subsystem without it being explicitly granted. A model where every change is modeled tested and the impact considered before being allowed to impact the live system. This leads to very predictable performance, reliability, resilience, and cost control. When everything is considered holistically the costs of the whole is known. In the world of mainframe it is not possible to hide costs within other budgets, while in the world of UNIX and Windows this is absolutely the normal. Just consider the ability of every department to purchase laptops, desktops, software, people, services etc. Every one of these elements is known in the mainframe world, and is only partly known in the distributed world. Today very few distributed environments are anywhere close to 100% compliance to their internal policies of device usage, software usage, configuration, or external access to internal systems. There are just too many ways users can circumvent the rules and any number of these can be exploited either intentionally or unintentionally. Some incredibly clever management tools are available to help lock down the environment, but this takes additional resources to implement, while the mainframe continues to have absolute control over all these aspects.

If the business wants to implement a new business process on the mainframe, it may seem to be very cumbersome, and may seem so much easier in the distributed world. But if the full costs including those of security, reliability are performance of the whole system are considered then the mainframe wins. This glasshouse versus distributed architecture model is not new of course, but a new member has been added to the team, Mr. Governance. Now all business processes need to follow very controlled guidelines to ensure that the letter and spirit of these new laws designed for the age of IT are followed. The costs of not following these rules are high today and are only likely to get higher. Huge fines, jail time and eventually businesses losing the rights to trade are the consequences of not meeting the law. Today we accept that a rat infested restaurant will be closed down, well get ready for the non-compliant business being closed down.

This maturity in the law brings with it the very real potential of an economic infrastructure that treats electronic transactions with the same legal value as paper transactions. This is incredibly good news for business (and is long overdue), but can only work when business is forced to adopt strong governance throughout the whole value chain. It’s happening right now, and this is great news for businesses that are already running mainframes, they already have the basis of exactly the right environment for the next stage of ITization of business. Having a well-managed mainframe is one of the strongest competitive advantages a company can have in the IT governance era.

Key to all this is “well managed” and the leader in managing IT is CA, who today simplify and unify the process of managing , governing and securing IT on the mainframe and distributed IT world.

David Liff

Call me an enthusiastic mainframe nerd. It’s time for me to admit it. After all, I’ve been working on mainframes for 20 years, and for the number one mainframe ISV for ten of those years.

And, I expect the mainframe to be a significant part of the rest of my career – which, by the way, I plan to last several more decades (if it’s up to me).

Why? Because I love quality, and being part of something very significant, and making a difference. The mainframe gives me all of these.

Not only that, but we’re living in a time when the IBM-360-descended mainframe environment – ecosystem, even – is at the leading edge of a renaissance, and I’m really excited to be part of it!

Now, if you’re a mainframer like I am, I suspect you already know exactly what I’m talking about. But just in case you’re not – or maybe you’d like to hear a voice other than your own expressing it, here are some examples:

1. Virtualization, introduced on the mainframe 35 years ago, is better than ever, enabling multiple different levels of multiple different operating systems to run concurrently on a single box – with hundreds or even thousands of images at the same time.
2. Mainframes are green! Their physical footprint, barely larger than a fridge, only hints at how small their energy and heat footprint is compared to “equivalent” computing power on other servers – especially considering that mainframes regularly run up to 100% busy for extended periods of time with no degradation in performance.
3. Mainframes are secure. Not only are they virus-free, but they are secured with advanced and comprehensive business-focused external security that meets the regulatory and security needs of the largest organizations on earth.
4. Mainframes are more affordable than ever, not to mention more affordable on a per user basis than other platforms when all relevant costs are accurately accounted for. Not only are all of the costs of mainframes straight-forward and measurable, but new innovations such as IBM’s zIIP and zAAP engines are making them even more cost-effective. I plan to write more about these specialty engines in future blogs.
5. Mainframes are running Linux. Not just one or two copies: I’m talking hundreds and even thousands of concurrent copies, with performance and reliability that outstrips other platforms.

And that’s just the beginning!

Which is good, because it’s also just the beginning of this mainframe blog.

So, help me out here: what do you think of the above assertions? Do you have any to add – or suggest corrections to? Have you ever thought about a career on the mainframe – or maybe even with a mainframe ISV?

These are exciting times, and as we enter a new age for the mainframe, I’m very interested in your perspectives on this important platform.

Catch you soon!

- Reg Harbeck