I spent this week engaged in philosophical debate on the subject of mainframe application output management with a dozen hard core zSeries specialists from IBM. These chaps had spent their entire working lives in, on and around mainframe systems. Compared to these guys I felt like the new kid on the team because I had only been working in IT for twenty-ish years.
When I started work, mainframes were falling out of favor. They were big and expensive, and the trend was toward more, smaller mid-range systems. Distributed computing, if you will, over cheap, commodity hardware. When I started in systems integration we talked about building abstraction layers over legacy applications to make it easier to migrate their functions away from the mainframe. When virtualization become vogue I was struck by how the wheel had turned full circle. Now we wanted to consolidate all these smaller boxes into virtual machines on fewer, more powerful machines. Well hold on now, isn't a VM just a fancy name for an LPAR?
The more I work with mainframe systems, the more I am impressed about the thought that went into their design from the very beginning. I am also impressed with IBM's determination to keep the mainframe relevant. The mainframe, as it turns out, is an excellent platform for hosting guest O/S. I have been reading about Marist College running 600 virtual Linux systems on their z9. It seems that businesses that depend on mainframes today will continue to do so with confidence. However, I am not sure how many corporations who do not currently run a mainframe would consider installing one.
Now that the mainframe is back in favor, it became apparent that we're going to need people to support and maintain them. I am hearing stories that 20,000 graduates a year are being recruited and trained to tame the big iron. I can see the interface to and administration of mainframes changing dramatically over the next few years, because let's face it, it is a bit ugly right now. We young whiper-snappers from the distributed world know a thing or two about making user interfaces intuitive and easy to use. I also expect to see the proliferation of typically distributed development languages to the mainframe (and not just via unix system services or VMs). In the meantime, the principles of writing good code apply to all languages even if it does mean learning a bit of JCL, REXX, C & COBOL.
These days I think less in terms of distributed versus mainframe and more about blended solutions that benefit the business and end users. The mainframe is evolving from a T-Rex that'll tear your head off, into a big friendly dog that will dribble on you until you give it a hug.
James
Atlanta
October 2009
