This week, I’m publishing a second blog entry from Marcel den Hartog, Principal Product Marketing for CA Technologies Mainframe Solutions. You can read more of his blogs here.
I know what you’re thinking: another Generation Z person wanting to ride the cloud hype and make sure we don’t forget about his favourite platform. But bear with me while I explain there is a lot of logic behind this...
I am old enough to remember the time when many of us in IT were surprised by the rise of the distributed environment. And, like many others, I did my fair share of work building applications on both mainframes and distributed servers. I was, however, lucky enough to work in an environment with little or no bias to any platform; our management simply asked us to pick the best platform for any given application.
Soon after building the first distributed applications, we found that we needed the data that resided on the mainframe. Not a big surprise, because most of the mission-critical data was stored on the mainframe AND we had a requirement that almost all the mission-critical data in the company had to be up-to-date, always!
This was not easy, especially in the early phases. We did not have ODBC, JDBC, MQSeries, Web services, or anything else that allowed us to send data back and forth from distributed applications to the mainframe. We had to rely on HLLAPI, a very low-level way of transmitting data by using the protocols that came with 3270 emulation boards like IRMA or Attachmate. And for the data that did not require continuous updates, we relied on extracts that were pumped up and down to a couple of distributed servers every night, where the data was then processed to make it usable for different applications.
The “fit-for-purpose” IT infrastructure we had back then was not ideal because it required a lot of work behind the scenes, mainly to make sure the data used by all these applications was up-to-date and “transformed” in the right way. But the technology became better and better, and with the move from text-based Clipper applications using HLLAPI to communicate with CICS transactions, we slowly moved to more modern, visually attractive programming languages that used more modern protocols like ODBC and JDBC. But since not all data on the mainframe or on distributed systems was capable of being accessed by these protocols (like VSAM files, IMS databases and others), for many applications we had to rely on data transport and transformation routines (and the servers to store and manage it) for many years. Even today, companies pump terabytes of data up and down their various platforms for many different purposes.
The next phase in IT was the switch from home-grown applications to buying applications like ERP, CRM, or other third-party (standardized) applications. And again, these applications not only required data from the mainframe and distributed applications, we also had to extract data FROM these applications to update the other applications our companies relied on. After all, every company runs with a mixture of applications on a mixture of platforms. And to complicate things even more, we do not buy all applications from the same vendors. So we have to exchange data between commercial applications as well. More complexity, more work, more money and more stuff to manage.
Welcome to the world of cloud. Where again, we will run (commercial) applications on a different platform and where we are (again) asked to make sure that our companies most valuable IT asset (our data) is up-to-date across all the different platforms: mainframe, cloud, and distributed. After all, we don’t want our customer data to be different across the different applications; the fact that we have to duplicate across all our different environments is already bad enough.
The efforts to create a pool of IT resources that enables us to create the “fit-for-purpose” IT infrastructure we are all aiming for has, until now, resulted in a very complex IT infrastructure that requires a lot of management. Here is where a latest IBM mainframe technology, comes in. The “pool of resources” can be found externally in the form of cloud services, as well as internally in blades that are configured to run virtualized systems on the mainframe. Adding the mainframe to this pool has big advantages. If you run Linux on the specialized engines (IFLs) on the mainframe, you need a lot less infrastructure to allow the Linux servers to communicate with each other and with your existing zOS applications. So there is no need for cabling and other network infrastructure. This not only greatly reduces the amount (and added complexity) of the hardware needed, it also means less power consumption and more flexibility. In the beginning of this article we agreed that many applications need access to mainframe data. By bringing the applications that need this data closer TO the mainframe, and by reducing the amount of infrastructure devices needed to connect it all, we make things simpler, faster, more manageable, and more reliable.
To make the mainframe part of an internal pool of IT resources that is flexible enough to accommodate the business needs of our management, there is one last step we must take; we need the right software to orchestrate, provision, and decommission servers on demand. There are already a number of vendors who offer software that helps you to provision both internal and external (cloud) resources in a matter of minutes. Simple drag-and-drop applications that provision servers and configure the network and connection settings make it possible to create complex environments in a matter of minutes. But none of them has supported the mainframe (yet). In the near future, however, the mainframe will also be supported, and this will open a new world of possibilities for everybody who already owns a mainframe. Soon, the mainframe will not just be used as part of an internal or hybrid cloud environment, it will act as one of the components you have in your pool of resources.
Yes, a stand-alone mainframe can offer many of the advantages that “cloud” offers: on-demand capacity, virtualization, flexibility and reliability. But not until you are able to use the mainframe as a component in a cloud infrastructure, so that you can bring the applications that need access to their data closer to the mainframe, will the two really be a perfect couple.
Sunday, 24 February 2013
Sunday, 17 February 2013
Review: Nuance PDF Converter Professional 8
As a regular and frequent user of Adobe Acrobat – the full version, not just the reader – I was intrigued to see whether anyone could come up with a product that was more useful or cheaper, so I welcomed the chance to have a look at the PC version of Nuance’s PDF Converter Professional 8.
It was easy to install and opened up a variety of PDFs that I had lying around. So that meant it was at least as good as the Adobe Reader! So next I had a look at some of the facilities and features it promised. In these days of cloud computing and document sharing, it offered that facility easily and fully. There’s a drop-down menu called ‘collaborate’ that calls up the Gaaiho Collaboration feature. When I installed, I included the Nuance Cloud Connector. I now have an ‘N:’ Nuance Cloud drive as one of my storage drive options. You can also save and open files on Dropbox.
The first thing I wanted to try was the ‘Advanced Edit option in the top row of the tool bar. This converts the PDF into a format that is editable. I changed the font and font size of text in a document. I was also able to insert whole paragraphs of text. I could even have added tables. I liked this feature.
It’s got quite a clever form-filling feature. You can download a form and start filling in the boxes. It’s even clever enough to tab to the next field. And it’s clever enough to convert an old PDF to a searchable PDF. And you can convert your PDF to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and WordPerfect documents.
Nuance also do Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software, and I hear they have something to do with Siri on iPhones, so they’ve included voice recognition in this software. It allows you to annotate your PDFs. Not sure whether I really need it, but it’s fun! And if you don’t want to speak, you can type into a resizable text box to make notes.
And like Acrobat, you can reduce file size and split the document. Tucked away on the left-hand side is the Pages tool. That gives you the option to add, replace, and delete pages – a feature I use quite often.
On the right-hand side is a pull-out menu that provides stamp options (you can make a stamp from any area of the PDF), security options, envelope and watermark options, as well as recovery and clip-art options.
Overall, it’s a clever and feature-rich piece of software. Considering its price compared to Adobe Acrobat and the extra facilities it offers, I think it is well worth taking a look at if you’re a regular (or plan to be a regular) user of PDFs.
It was easy to install and opened up a variety of PDFs that I had lying around. So that meant it was at least as good as the Adobe Reader! So next I had a look at some of the facilities and features it promised. In these days of cloud computing and document sharing, it offered that facility easily and fully. There’s a drop-down menu called ‘collaborate’ that calls up the Gaaiho Collaboration feature. When I installed, I included the Nuance Cloud Connector. I now have an ‘N:’ Nuance Cloud drive as one of my storage drive options. You can also save and open files on Dropbox.
The first thing I wanted to try was the ‘Advanced Edit option in the top row of the tool bar. This converts the PDF into a format that is editable. I changed the font and font size of text in a document. I was also able to insert whole paragraphs of text. I could even have added tables. I liked this feature.
It’s got quite a clever form-filling feature. You can download a form and start filling in the boxes. It’s even clever enough to tab to the next field. And it’s clever enough to convert an old PDF to a searchable PDF. And you can convert your PDF to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and WordPerfect documents.
Nuance also do Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software, and I hear they have something to do with Siri on iPhones, so they’ve included voice recognition in this software. It allows you to annotate your PDFs. Not sure whether I really need it, but it’s fun! And if you don’t want to speak, you can type into a resizable text box to make notes.
And like Acrobat, you can reduce file size and split the document. Tucked away on the left-hand side is the Pages tool. That gives you the option to add, replace, and delete pages – a feature I use quite often.
On the right-hand side is a pull-out menu that provides stamp options (you can make a stamp from any area of the PDF), security options, envelope and watermark options, as well as recovery and clip-art options.
Overall, it’s a clever and feature-rich piece of software. Considering its price compared to Adobe Acrobat and the extra facilities it offers, I think it is well worth taking a look at if you’re a regular (or plan to be a regular) user of PDFs.
Sunday, 3 February 2013
BYOD growing in importance at mainframe sites
The Arcati Mainframe Yearbook 2013 is now available for download from www.arcati.com/newyearbook13 – and it’s FREE. Each new Yearbook is always greeted with enthusiasm by mainframers everywhere because it is such a unique source of information. And each year, many people find the results of the user survey especially interesting. And this year, for the first time, we asked about BYOD (Bring Your Own Device).
Firstly, we wanted to know how important sites thought it was to make mainframe data available to other platforms. 82 percent of sites said that it was very important to the way they work at the moment. When it comes to how important the idea of people using their own devices is to access mainframes, 10 percent of sites said it was very important to the way they work now – but 18 percent are in the planning stages, and a further 12 percent expect to be in the future.
There’s been a huge growth in the use of social media in recent years, and we wondered whether mainframers found social media (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc) useful for their work on the mainframe. A fifth (20 percent) said that they did, with eight percent not sure, and the rest not using it at all. Perhaps a surprisingly low figure, with IBM having Facebook pages dedicated to IMS, CICS, and DB2.
The survey also looked at IBM’s PureSystems – said to combine the flexibility of a general purpose system, the elasticity of cloud, and the simplicity of an appliance. They are integrated by design and come with built-in expertise. So, that’s the hype, but were survey respondents actually buying them? Only two percent of respondents said they were and, similarly, only two percent said they planned to. The survey also looked at the take up of business analytics (IBM’s Smarter Analytics). Here the take up was slightly higher, but again it makes disappointing reading for IBM, with four percent of sites saying they were currently using the technology and another four percent planning to.
Talk of Linux on mainframes has used the old joke of’ taking ten years to become an overnight success’ for a little while now. But this year, the survey found only 34 percent of respondents (down from last year’s 44 percent) said that they run Linux on the System z (with another 16 percent, up from last year’s 6 percent, at the planning stage). There are considerable cost and management benefits of consolidating distributed Linux workloads onto the mainframe, and IBM made the IFL (Integrated Facility for Linux) specialty processor available in 2001. Even so, running Linux on a mainframe seems now to be a mainstream technology.
Oracle and DB2 have been at loggerheads for a while now, but while the survey was thinking about Linux on mainframes, it queried how many sites were running Oracle under Linux on System z. Just eight percent of sites surveyed said that they currently run Oracle on zLinux, with another eight percent planning to.
The survey was completed by100 individuals between the 1 November 2012 and the 7 December 2012. Just under half (48 percent) were from North America and just over a third (36 percent) were from Europe, with 10 percent from the Asia/Pacific region, and eight percent from the Middle East/Africa.
48 percent of the companies have in excess of 10,000 employees worldwide. Below that, with 20 percent of respondents, are staff sizes of 1001-5000. With 12 percent of responses are staff sizes of 5001-1000. And with 10 percent each are staff sizes of 1 to 200 and 201 to 1000. 84 percent of our respondents were involved in running in-house data centres, with only six percent working in an outsourced operation.
So what are the main benefits for an organization of using a mainframe over other platforms? 88 percent of respondents highlighted the benefit of availability, with 74percent identifying security as a benefit. Scalability and manageability came next with scores of 68 and 66 percent respectively.
So why isn’t everyone using a mainframe? 82 percent thought mainframes are too expensive (or appear to be). 58 percent thought that there are cultural barriers between mainframers and other IT professionals. 24 percent identified concerns about future availability/support for mainframe applications, 18 percent said difficulty in obtaining or retaining the necessary skills, and 12 percent thought mainframes are too complex (or appear to be). Sadly, only two percent thought there were no obstacles to mainframe acceptance.
Full details of all the questions and responses can be found in the user survey section of the Yearbook. It’s well worth a read.
The Yearbook can only be free because some organizations have been prepared to sponsor it or advertise in it. This year’s sponsors were: Software AG, Software Diversified Services (SDS), and William Data Systems.
Firstly, we wanted to know how important sites thought it was to make mainframe data available to other platforms. 82 percent of sites said that it was very important to the way they work at the moment. When it comes to how important the idea of people using their own devices is to access mainframes, 10 percent of sites said it was very important to the way they work now – but 18 percent are in the planning stages, and a further 12 percent expect to be in the future.
There’s been a huge growth in the use of social media in recent years, and we wondered whether mainframers found social media (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc) useful for their work on the mainframe. A fifth (20 percent) said that they did, with eight percent not sure, and the rest not using it at all. Perhaps a surprisingly low figure, with IBM having Facebook pages dedicated to IMS, CICS, and DB2.
The survey also looked at IBM’s PureSystems – said to combine the flexibility of a general purpose system, the elasticity of cloud, and the simplicity of an appliance. They are integrated by design and come with built-in expertise. So, that’s the hype, but were survey respondents actually buying them? Only two percent of respondents said they were and, similarly, only two percent said they planned to. The survey also looked at the take up of business analytics (IBM’s Smarter Analytics). Here the take up was slightly higher, but again it makes disappointing reading for IBM, with four percent of sites saying they were currently using the technology and another four percent planning to.
Talk of Linux on mainframes has used the old joke of’ taking ten years to become an overnight success’ for a little while now. But this year, the survey found only 34 percent of respondents (down from last year’s 44 percent) said that they run Linux on the System z (with another 16 percent, up from last year’s 6 percent, at the planning stage). There are considerable cost and management benefits of consolidating distributed Linux workloads onto the mainframe, and IBM made the IFL (Integrated Facility for Linux) specialty processor available in 2001. Even so, running Linux on a mainframe seems now to be a mainstream technology.
Oracle and DB2 have been at loggerheads for a while now, but while the survey was thinking about Linux on mainframes, it queried how many sites were running Oracle under Linux on System z. Just eight percent of sites surveyed said that they currently run Oracle on zLinux, with another eight percent planning to.
The survey was completed by100 individuals between the 1 November 2012 and the 7 December 2012. Just under half (48 percent) were from North America and just over a third (36 percent) were from Europe, with 10 percent from the Asia/Pacific region, and eight percent from the Middle East/Africa.
48 percent of the companies have in excess of 10,000 employees worldwide. Below that, with 20 percent of respondents, are staff sizes of 1001-5000. With 12 percent of responses are staff sizes of 5001-1000. And with 10 percent each are staff sizes of 1 to 200 and 201 to 1000. 84 percent of our respondents were involved in running in-house data centres, with only six percent working in an outsourced operation.
So what are the main benefits for an organization of using a mainframe over other platforms? 88 percent of respondents highlighted the benefit of availability, with 74percent identifying security as a benefit. Scalability and manageability came next with scores of 68 and 66 percent respectively.
So why isn’t everyone using a mainframe? 82 percent thought mainframes are too expensive (or appear to be). 58 percent thought that there are cultural barriers between mainframers and other IT professionals. 24 percent identified concerns about future availability/support for mainframe applications, 18 percent said difficulty in obtaining or retaining the necessary skills, and 12 percent thought mainframes are too complex (or appear to be). Sadly, only two percent thought there were no obstacles to mainframe acceptance.
Full details of all the questions and responses can be found in the user survey section of the Yearbook. It’s well worth a read.
The Yearbook can only be free because some organizations have been prepared to sponsor it or advertise in it. This year’s sponsors were: Software AG, Software Diversified Services (SDS), and William Data Systems.
Sunday, 27 January 2013
Guest blog - IT made simple? Automation lessons from the mainframe
This week, for a change, I’m publishing a blog entry from Marcel den Hartog, Principal Product Marketing for CA Technologies Mainframe Solutions.
Many moons ago, some smart people invented machines to do things (that were previously done manually) faster, better, and more consistently. Good examples are the car industry, the way we make (made) light bulbs, and how we produce clothes or other fabrics. Not much later, people invented machines to automate administrative tasks, so we could calculate faster and have better insights in our financials, with fewer people than ever before. Programmable typewriters are an early example, but the first simple computers did exactly that, add and subtract numbers faster and with fewer errors than an employee could (and ideally with no errors at all!).
The main reason for people inventing “machines” like this was to do things more efficiently, which in turn would make them more competitive. It was as simple as that. True, the equipment was a bit more complex, but the advantages far outweighed the problems of complexity.
This is where Information Technology was born. We soon needed people to drive these “machines”, maintain them, and program them to perform new tasks. And before we knew it, we had simplified a lot of manual tasks, invented some that we didn’t even know existed, and, probably even more important, we were seen as just another part of the business. A part that was able to help the company to run more efficiently and become more competitive.
Automation, in the most general sense, also helped our civilization to evolve faster and faster. Automating more meant we had more time to study, more time to invent even better technology that could automate even more...
However, somehow, at some point in the recent past, something went wrong. We kept implementing more technology that helped us to automate more bits and pieces, but we somehow forgot the next step of automation – automating our automation. Sounds weird? Well, look at how many manual interventions today’s IT systems need to keep them healthy. Ask your IT peers why it still takes 10 days to implement a new server (or 3 days if you do it on a virtualized server farm). Go and ask your Help Desk staff how much time it takes for a performance issue to bubble up, and get fixed again. Ask your operations staff how many of their events (across platforms) have automated actions attached to them that do stuff that could replace manual interventions...
Now, please don’t get me wrong, I know that there are many IT departments that have implemented automation in their IT environment. But in all fairness, it’s not really enough to cope with the complexity of today’s environments. There is another reason, however, for bringing this up now. In the past four years, many IT departments have implemented virtualization in some way. Some have been more successful than others, but there is one thing most people seem to agree on: the current mix of servers – Enterprise Servers like the IBM mainframe, standalone Unix, Linux, and Windows servers, and many virtualized systems running different kinds of OSs – is already hard to manage, and automation is already quite difficult. If the signs are right, we will add a lot of new stuff making it even harder to monitor, manage, and control everything we have.
With the addition of support for mobile devices, Cloud initiatives, and Big Data, we will be confronted with new and unpredictable behaviours arising from our systems. So if there were ever a time to give some extra attention to automate the things we already have, it’s now – at least then we will be more prepared for the unknowns that these new initiatives will bring us. I really think that this is also one of the ways to demonstrate to “the business” that IT really is ready to bring in the new IT services that the business requires. In the past, IT has often been accused of spending too much money to “keep the lights on”. Part of this, as we all know, is the fact that we still spend too much money and time on manual work (and interventions ) to keep these same lights on.
Now, please go back to my first paragraph and tell me if this sounds familiar. The business is now ready for new initiatives like Cloud, Big Data, and more and better support for mobile devices because it will help them to work in a more cost-effective way. IT is also ready for the next step, when we will be required to automate more of what is now running the business, to make sure that it runs as an efficient engine that needs a lot less attention, but also to free up the resources needed to run the new services that the business requires us to run...
I think we can all agree that what I just wrote makes sense. So why not go back to history once more for a final lesson?
Many Fortune 500 companies still run the majority of their mission-critical business services on a mainframe. And for good reason: it is a reliable environment, cost effective, and it is a platform that doesn’t confront managers with a lot of surprises. Some people might call this “boring”, others would say that it’s the way things are supposed to be run. Because of the nature of the mainframe (it was once the ONLY platform to run IT services on) automation has been perfected on this platform in the past decades. Some companies have tens of thousands of “rules” that kick in once unexpected things happen. Looking for proof? See how many people the average mainframe is managed with, compare that with the amount of mission-critical transactions running on that same mainframe, and everybody will agree that you need fewer people to manage a mainframe than you do to manage other environments. With mainframes, you really can have IT made simple.
People learn from the past. Experience is what has brought mankind to where it is today. But for some strange reason, we tend to think of history as something that goes 50+ years back. In IT, going back in history to learn something simply means going back 6-10 years. Talk to your mainframe peers, learn from their experience, and find how you can benefit from their automation expertise. It will not only make your current infrastructure run better, it will also help you to demonstrate to the business that you are ready for the next bulk of new and innovative IT projects – and you will save some money at the same time. And who doesn’t want to do that these days?
Many moons ago, some smart people invented machines to do things (that were previously done manually) faster, better, and more consistently. Good examples are the car industry, the way we make (made) light bulbs, and how we produce clothes or other fabrics. Not much later, people invented machines to automate administrative tasks, so we could calculate faster and have better insights in our financials, with fewer people than ever before. Programmable typewriters are an early example, but the first simple computers did exactly that, add and subtract numbers faster and with fewer errors than an employee could (and ideally with no errors at all!).
The main reason for people inventing “machines” like this was to do things more efficiently, which in turn would make them more competitive. It was as simple as that. True, the equipment was a bit more complex, but the advantages far outweighed the problems of complexity.
This is where Information Technology was born. We soon needed people to drive these “machines”, maintain them, and program them to perform new tasks. And before we knew it, we had simplified a lot of manual tasks, invented some that we didn’t even know existed, and, probably even more important, we were seen as just another part of the business. A part that was able to help the company to run more efficiently and become more competitive.
Automation, in the most general sense, also helped our civilization to evolve faster and faster. Automating more meant we had more time to study, more time to invent even better technology that could automate even more...
However, somehow, at some point in the recent past, something went wrong. We kept implementing more technology that helped us to automate more bits and pieces, but we somehow forgot the next step of automation – automating our automation. Sounds weird? Well, look at how many manual interventions today’s IT systems need to keep them healthy. Ask your IT peers why it still takes 10 days to implement a new server (or 3 days if you do it on a virtualized server farm). Go and ask your Help Desk staff how much time it takes for a performance issue to bubble up, and get fixed again. Ask your operations staff how many of their events (across platforms) have automated actions attached to them that do stuff that could replace manual interventions...
Now, please don’t get me wrong, I know that there are many IT departments that have implemented automation in their IT environment. But in all fairness, it’s not really enough to cope with the complexity of today’s environments. There is another reason, however, for bringing this up now. In the past four years, many IT departments have implemented virtualization in some way. Some have been more successful than others, but there is one thing most people seem to agree on: the current mix of servers – Enterprise Servers like the IBM mainframe, standalone Unix, Linux, and Windows servers, and many virtualized systems running different kinds of OSs – is already hard to manage, and automation is already quite difficult. If the signs are right, we will add a lot of new stuff making it even harder to monitor, manage, and control everything we have.
With the addition of support for mobile devices, Cloud initiatives, and Big Data, we will be confronted with new and unpredictable behaviours arising from our systems. So if there were ever a time to give some extra attention to automate the things we already have, it’s now – at least then we will be more prepared for the unknowns that these new initiatives will bring us. I really think that this is also one of the ways to demonstrate to “the business” that IT really is ready to bring in the new IT services that the business requires. In the past, IT has often been accused of spending too much money to “keep the lights on”. Part of this, as we all know, is the fact that we still spend too much money and time on manual work (and interventions ) to keep these same lights on.
Now, please go back to my first paragraph and tell me if this sounds familiar. The business is now ready for new initiatives like Cloud, Big Data, and more and better support for mobile devices because it will help them to work in a more cost-effective way. IT is also ready for the next step, when we will be required to automate more of what is now running the business, to make sure that it runs as an efficient engine that needs a lot less attention, but also to free up the resources needed to run the new services that the business requires us to run...
I think we can all agree that what I just wrote makes sense. So why not go back to history once more for a final lesson?
Many Fortune 500 companies still run the majority of their mission-critical business services on a mainframe. And for good reason: it is a reliable environment, cost effective, and it is a platform that doesn’t confront managers with a lot of surprises. Some people might call this “boring”, others would say that it’s the way things are supposed to be run. Because of the nature of the mainframe (it was once the ONLY platform to run IT services on) automation has been perfected on this platform in the past decades. Some companies have tens of thousands of “rules” that kick in once unexpected things happen. Looking for proof? See how many people the average mainframe is managed with, compare that with the amount of mission-critical transactions running on that same mainframe, and everybody will agree that you need fewer people to manage a mainframe than you do to manage other environments. With mainframes, you really can have IT made simple.
People learn from the past. Experience is what has brought mankind to where it is today. But for some strange reason, we tend to think of history as something that goes 50+ years back. In IT, going back in history to learn something simply means going back 6-10 years. Talk to your mainframe peers, learn from their experience, and find how you can benefit from their automation expertise. It will not only make your current infrastructure run better, it will also help you to demonstrate to the business that you are ready for the next bulk of new and innovative IT projects – and you will save some money at the same time. And who doesn’t want to do that these days?
Sunday, 20 January 2013
The Arcati Mainframe Yearbook 2013 has been published
Every year, about this time, mainframe users are excited to get their hands on the latest edition of the Arcati Mainframe Yearbook. What makes the Yearbook stand out is that it’s an excellent reference work for all IBM mainframe professionals – no matter how many years of experience they have.
What makes this annual publication so important? The answer is that it provides a one-stop shop for everything a mainframer needs to know. For example, the technical specification section includes model numbers, MIPS, and MSUs for zEnterprise processors (zEC12s, z196s and z114s). There’s also a hardware timeline, and a display of mainframe operating system evolution.
In addition, there’s the glossary of terminology section explaining what all those acronyms stand for, in a way that means you can understand them.
One section provides a media guide for IBM mainframers. This includes information on newsletters, magazines, user groups, blogs, and social networking information resources for the z/OS environment. Amongst the things it highlights are Enterprise Tech Journal, IBM Listservs, SHARE’s Five Minute Briefing on the Data Center, Facebook (fan) pages, and LinkedIn discussions. As well as user groups such as SHARE and IDUG.
The vendor directory section contains an up-to-date list of vendors, consultants, and service providers working in the z/OS environment. There’s a summary of the products they supply and contact information. As usual, there are a number of new organizations in the list this year, and, sadly, a few familiar names have ceased trading.
The mainframe strategy section contains articles by industry gurus and vendors on topics such as: Where is the COBOL in your SOA?; Lost without a trace?; and Challenging times lead to new tools for z/OS control and network management.
For many people the highlight each year is the mainframe user survey. This illustrates just what’s been happening at users’ sites. It’s a good way for mainframers to compare what they are planning to do with what other sites have done. I will be looking at some of the survey highlights in a future blog.
The other great thing about the Yearbook – as far as many of the 20,000 people who download it are concerned – is that it is completely FREE.
It can only be free because some organizations have been prepared to sponsor it or advertise in it. This year’s sponsors were: Software AG, Software Diversified Services (SDS), and William Data Systems.
To see this year’s Arcati Mainframe Yearbook, click on www.arcati.com/newyearbook13. If you don’t want to download everything at once, again this year, each section is available as a separate PDF file.
Don’t miss out on this excellent publication.
What makes this annual publication so important? The answer is that it provides a one-stop shop for everything a mainframer needs to know. For example, the technical specification section includes model numbers, MIPS, and MSUs for zEnterprise processors (zEC12s, z196s and z114s). There’s also a hardware timeline, and a display of mainframe operating system evolution.
In addition, there’s the glossary of terminology section explaining what all those acronyms stand for, in a way that means you can understand them.
One section provides a media guide for IBM mainframers. This includes information on newsletters, magazines, user groups, blogs, and social networking information resources for the z/OS environment. Amongst the things it highlights are Enterprise Tech Journal, IBM Listservs, SHARE’s Five Minute Briefing on the Data Center, Facebook (fan) pages, and LinkedIn discussions. As well as user groups such as SHARE and IDUG.
The vendor directory section contains an up-to-date list of vendors, consultants, and service providers working in the z/OS environment. There’s a summary of the products they supply and contact information. As usual, there are a number of new organizations in the list this year, and, sadly, a few familiar names have ceased trading.
The mainframe strategy section contains articles by industry gurus and vendors on topics such as: Where is the COBOL in your SOA?; Lost without a trace?; and Challenging times lead to new tools for z/OS control and network management.
For many people the highlight each year is the mainframe user survey. This illustrates just what’s been happening at users’ sites. It’s a good way for mainframers to compare what they are planning to do with what other sites have done. I will be looking at some of the survey highlights in a future blog.
The other great thing about the Yearbook – as far as many of the 20,000 people who download it are concerned – is that it is completely FREE.
It can only be free because some organizations have been prepared to sponsor it or advertise in it. This year’s sponsors were: Software AG, Software Diversified Services (SDS), and William Data Systems.
To see this year’s Arcati Mainframe Yearbook, click on www.arcati.com/newyearbook13. If you don’t want to download everything at once, again this year, each section is available as a separate PDF file.
Don’t miss out on this excellent publication.
Monday, 14 January 2013
How much data is enough?
In the past, the only way of storing data was in your head. So, in less developed societies, older people were revered because their heads contained information about how to deal with problems. They remembered how the tribe or village survived last time everywhere flooded or the last major drought. They knew high spots or springs that don’t dry up.
Many societies have tried to make this information available to others by creating songs or poems that recite the lore – so that future generations will not forget the deeds of great heroes, but, more importantly, the list of tips and tricks for surviving in difficult situations.
Then came writing. There was now the ability to list the kings, so it was obvious who should be the next ruler. Or to list the goods that were to be bartered for some other set of goods. Or to record just how many sheep and goats someone owned at the end of each year. And writing in stone, which could last for many years, was later replaced by writing on papyrus, and eventually on paper. With the advent of printing, it became possible to create definitive lists of laws or stories that everyone had access to (well, provided they could read!).
And in our headlong rush through time, we get to the early computers. People could store information on them – like the milk yields of their cows and how much food the herd consumed, or how many coffees were sold in each coffee shop in a chain, or what you wanted for Christmas. And not only could you store data, you could calculate answers to questions. But it was all pretty much driven by humans for humans. And generally you knew where it was stored – even if it was on a mainframe in a different country, you could find the address of site.
But now two of those factors are changing, and changing in a very big way. Now, a lot of the data isn’t created by humans, it’s coming from devices. Let me expand on that. Every time you use your credit card, information about your purchases and where you purchased them is very likely stored somewhere, so the retailer can target adverts at you, and so they have a better idea of what types of product sell well in different parts of the country. Requiring even less human intervention is all the footage that gets stored from security cameras. No humans are involved in the recording and storage. And there are many other examples of devices that just store information. As time goes on, and more-and-more information is stored, there’s going to be a requirement for more-and-more storage. I’m sure someone somewhere has worked out the numbers, but if 500GB of storage occupies half a square foot, and the amount of data stored doubles every year, then in 20 years time, the whole planet will be covered in storage devices to the depth of 18 inches!!
But where is your data? Originally it was on your hard drive or on DASD in your organization’s buildings. But nowadays, I have most of my customer-facing files on Google Drive, and, so long as I’m in a wifi area, I use the CloudOn app on my tablet to show customers PowerPoint presentations as well as Word documents and Excel spreadsheets. I also use Dropbox for sharing files with friends. The point I’m making is that I have no idea where those files are physically stored. And, for business files, that brings a huge security issue. For example, European organizations are pretty much prevented from using US-based, or indeterminate location, because they’re outside the EU.
It seems at this rate that there will always be more data to store (somewhere) – and hopefully there will always be enough storage, without covering the whole planet. But will there be any more knowledge in the world?
Many societies have tried to make this information available to others by creating songs or poems that recite the lore – so that future generations will not forget the deeds of great heroes, but, more importantly, the list of tips and tricks for surviving in difficult situations.
Then came writing. There was now the ability to list the kings, so it was obvious who should be the next ruler. Or to list the goods that were to be bartered for some other set of goods. Or to record just how many sheep and goats someone owned at the end of each year. And writing in stone, which could last for many years, was later replaced by writing on papyrus, and eventually on paper. With the advent of printing, it became possible to create definitive lists of laws or stories that everyone had access to (well, provided they could read!).
And in our headlong rush through time, we get to the early computers. People could store information on them – like the milk yields of their cows and how much food the herd consumed, or how many coffees were sold in each coffee shop in a chain, or what you wanted for Christmas. And not only could you store data, you could calculate answers to questions. But it was all pretty much driven by humans for humans. And generally you knew where it was stored – even if it was on a mainframe in a different country, you could find the address of site.
But now two of those factors are changing, and changing in a very big way. Now, a lot of the data isn’t created by humans, it’s coming from devices. Let me expand on that. Every time you use your credit card, information about your purchases and where you purchased them is very likely stored somewhere, so the retailer can target adverts at you, and so they have a better idea of what types of product sell well in different parts of the country. Requiring even less human intervention is all the footage that gets stored from security cameras. No humans are involved in the recording and storage. And there are many other examples of devices that just store information. As time goes on, and more-and-more information is stored, there’s going to be a requirement for more-and-more storage. I’m sure someone somewhere has worked out the numbers, but if 500GB of storage occupies half a square foot, and the amount of data stored doubles every year, then in 20 years time, the whole planet will be covered in storage devices to the depth of 18 inches!!
But where is your data? Originally it was on your hard drive or on DASD in your organization’s buildings. But nowadays, I have most of my customer-facing files on Google Drive, and, so long as I’m in a wifi area, I use the CloudOn app on my tablet to show customers PowerPoint presentations as well as Word documents and Excel spreadsheets. I also use Dropbox for sharing files with friends. The point I’m making is that I have no idea where those files are physically stored. And, for business files, that brings a huge security issue. For example, European organizations are pretty much prevented from using US-based, or indeterminate location, because they’re outside the EU.
It seems at this rate that there will always be more data to store (somewhere) – and hopefully there will always be enough storage, without covering the whole planet. But will there be any more knowledge in the world?
Sunday, 6 January 2013
2012 at iTech-Ed Ltd
As it’s the start of the New Year, I thought I’d review events of 2012 through the lens of events at iTech-Ed Ltd.
In January, The Arcati Mainframe Yearbook 2012 was published. It had around 20,000 downloads during the course of the year, and I’m Editorial Director for this highly-respected annual source of mainframe information. My blog, “Gazing into the IT Crystal Ball...”, was published on the Destination z Web site. And the Virtual CICS user group meeting on 17 January had a presentation from IBM Hursley’s Andrew Smithson entitled, “CICS Transaction Gateway V8.1”.
In February, my blog “Staying in Touch With the Mainframe Community” was published on the Destination z Web site, and an earlier blog was quoted from on the Dancing Dinosaur site. The Virtual IMS user group had a presentations from Neil Price, a senior DBA and systems programmer with TNT Express ICS on 7 February. His talk was entitled, “Memoirs of a HALDBA”.
My article entitled: “The z114: Delivering Game-Changing Opportunities” was published in the March/April issue of z/Journal. My blog “Saving Money With Mainframes” can be found on the Destination z Web site. And of the 6 March, the Virtual CICS user group meeting had a presentation from Fundi Software’s Jim Martin entitled, “Analyzing CICS function shipping applications using Transaction Analysis Workbench”.
3 April saw a presentation to the Virtual IMS user group by Fundi Software’s James Martin, entitled, “Using IMS Performance Solution Pack for z/OS to analyze IMS performance problems”. And my blog “The Sincerest Form of Flattery” was published on the Destination z Web site.
In May, my blog “The Mainframe’s Potential to Get Social” was published on the Destination z Web site. And on 8 May, at the Virtual CICS user group meeting, Stephen Mitchell, Managing Director of Matter of Fact Software Limited, gave a presentation entitled, “Utilizing the Dojo Toolkit for Web browser-driven applications from CICS”.
The 12 June saw a presentation by GT Software’s Dusty Rivers to the Virtual IMS user group entitled, “Modernizing IMS”. And the Destination z Web site published my blog “Atomic Weapons and the Dawn of the Computer Age”.
On 10 July, Ezriel Gross, CEO of Circle Software Inc, gave a presentation to the Virtual CICS user group entitled, “CICS introduction to Web services for the system programmer”. Also in July, my blog “IBM and Augmented Reality” was published on the Destination z Web site.
The Virtual IMS user group enjoyed a presentation by SQData’s CEO, Scott Quillicy, on 7 August entitled, “Best practices: IMS to relational data movement”. My blog “BYOD and Network Security” was published on the Destination z Web site in August.
In September, my blog “IMS: There’s Still Life in the Old Dog!” appeared on the Destination z Web site. Also in September, the Virtual CICS user group enjoyed a presentation entitled, “Success paths for integrating CICS with new technologies” from Don Spoerke, Principle Solutions Engineer with GT Software.
October saw my blog “What’s New With CICS?” published here on the Destination z Web site. In the same month, IBM’s “Think BIG” Information On Demand conference site published “IOD from Afar” and “IOD News” on their official IOD blog site.
In November, Colin Pearce gave a very enjoyable and detailed presentation to the Virtual CICS user group about “CICS security”. The IBM ‘Proud to be part of z’ poster came out that month. Look out for the person in the bottom row, third from the left! And the Destination z Web site published my blog “New Poster Captures the Mainframer Mosiac”.
On 4 December, the Virtual IMS user group had a presentation by BMC’s Bill Chapin about “Nearing 24x7 availability with structure changes too!” Also in December, Trevor’s blog “Whatever Happened to the Network Guy?” was published on the Destination z Web site.
Also last year, I was made a 2012 IBM Champion – that’s four years in a row I’ve been an IBM Champion. I continued to blog at mainframeupdate.blogspot.com and it.toolbox.com/blogs/mainframe-world/. And I continued to tweet at twitter.com/t_eddolls, twitter.com/virtualims, and twitter.com/virtualcics. And on Facebook you can find me at fb.com/itech-ed, fb.com/VirtualIMS, and fb.com/VirtualCICS. And I have groups on LinkedIn for Virtual IMS (www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=379256) and Virtual CICS (www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=3847862) – come on LinkedIn, do short names! And I’m on Google plus (if you like, you can find me at gplus.to/teddolls).
And don’t forget, the Arcati Mainframe Yearbook 2013, will be published very shortly. And look out for this year’s meetings of the Virtual IMS and Virtual CICS user groups.
Trevor Eddolls
In January, The Arcati Mainframe Yearbook 2012 was published. It had around 20,000 downloads during the course of the year, and I’m Editorial Director for this highly-respected annual source of mainframe information. My blog, “Gazing into the IT Crystal Ball...”, was published on the Destination z Web site. And the Virtual CICS user group meeting on 17 January had a presentation from IBM Hursley’s Andrew Smithson entitled, “CICS Transaction Gateway V8.1”.
In February, my blog “Staying in Touch With the Mainframe Community” was published on the Destination z Web site, and an earlier blog was quoted from on the Dancing Dinosaur site. The Virtual IMS user group had a presentations from Neil Price, a senior DBA and systems programmer with TNT Express ICS on 7 February. His talk was entitled, “Memoirs of a HALDBA”.
My article entitled: “The z114: Delivering Game-Changing Opportunities” was published in the March/April issue of z/Journal. My blog “Saving Money With Mainframes” can be found on the Destination z Web site. And of the 6 March, the Virtual CICS user group meeting had a presentation from Fundi Software’s Jim Martin entitled, “Analyzing CICS function shipping applications using Transaction Analysis Workbench”.
3 April saw a presentation to the Virtual IMS user group by Fundi Software’s James Martin, entitled, “Using IMS Performance Solution Pack for z/OS to analyze IMS performance problems”. And my blog “The Sincerest Form of Flattery” was published on the Destination z Web site.
In May, my blog “The Mainframe’s Potential to Get Social” was published on the Destination z Web site. And on 8 May, at the Virtual CICS user group meeting, Stephen Mitchell, Managing Director of Matter of Fact Software Limited, gave a presentation entitled, “Utilizing the Dojo Toolkit for Web browser-driven applications from CICS”.
The 12 June saw a presentation by GT Software’s Dusty Rivers to the Virtual IMS user group entitled, “Modernizing IMS”. And the Destination z Web site published my blog “Atomic Weapons and the Dawn of the Computer Age”.
On 10 July, Ezriel Gross, CEO of Circle Software Inc, gave a presentation to the Virtual CICS user group entitled, “CICS introduction to Web services for the system programmer”. Also in July, my blog “IBM and Augmented Reality” was published on the Destination z Web site.
The Virtual IMS user group enjoyed a presentation by SQData’s CEO, Scott Quillicy, on 7 August entitled, “Best practices: IMS to relational data movement”. My blog “BYOD and Network Security” was published on the Destination z Web site in August.
In September, my blog “IMS: There’s Still Life in the Old Dog!” appeared on the Destination z Web site. Also in September, the Virtual CICS user group enjoyed a presentation entitled, “Success paths for integrating CICS with new technologies” from Don Spoerke, Principle Solutions Engineer with GT Software.
October saw my blog “What’s New With CICS?” published here on the Destination z Web site. In the same month, IBM’s “Think BIG” Information On Demand conference site published “IOD from Afar” and “IOD News” on their official IOD blog site.
In November, Colin Pearce gave a very enjoyable and detailed presentation to the Virtual CICS user group about “CICS security”. The IBM ‘Proud to be part of z’ poster came out that month. Look out for the person in the bottom row, third from the left! And the Destination z Web site published my blog “New Poster Captures the Mainframer Mosiac”.
On 4 December, the Virtual IMS user group had a presentation by BMC’s Bill Chapin about “Nearing 24x7 availability with structure changes too!” Also in December, Trevor’s blog “Whatever Happened to the Network Guy?” was published on the Destination z Web site.
Also last year, I was made a 2012 IBM Champion – that’s four years in a row I’ve been an IBM Champion. I continued to blog at mainframeupdate.blogspot.com and it.toolbox.com/blogs/mainframe-world/. And I continued to tweet at twitter.com/t_eddolls, twitter.com/virtualims, and twitter.com/virtualcics. And on Facebook you can find me at fb.com/itech-ed, fb.com/VirtualIMS, and fb.com/VirtualCICS. And I have groups on LinkedIn for Virtual IMS (www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=379256) and Virtual CICS (www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=3847862) – come on LinkedIn, do short names! And I’m on Google plus (if you like, you can find me at gplus.to/teddolls).
And don’t forget, the Arcati Mainframe Yearbook 2013, will be published very shortly. And look out for this year’s meetings of the Virtual IMS and Virtual CICS user groups.
Trevor Eddolls
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