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Image Problem

While mainframes have continued to improve and evolve to remain viable, they suffer from an image problem, said Clipper Group's Kahn. "Since 1994," he said, "I have written many times about the mainframe, and in each I have explained, and repeated, why it seems to be misunderstood by many, mostly younger folks, who have presumed that it must be over the hill, out of touch, or dead as a dinosaur."

Said Kahn, "The bottom line is always the same -- don't criticize what you haven't taken the time to understand."

In a June 2008 story on ITbusinessedge.com, Carl Weinschenk interviewed Ralph Crosby, data management infrastructure architect for the Mainframe Service Management Business Unit at BMC Software. In the interview, Crosby is quoted as saying he believes the mainframe is coming back:
"I think, in reality, it is coming back. I think the configurations may be a little different, but it still has the same fundamental things that made it popular: high resilience, high reliability, high transaction capabilities. I think what is happening is that people are realizing what its strengths are and where it belongs in the data center, what pieces of IT infrastructure require that level of resilience and robustness. It's evolutionary, not revolutionary. "

When Weinschenk asked what this means for people who manage the computing environment, Crosby replied: "When workstations and UNIX and the middle tier all were exploding 20 years ago, there seemed to be a chasm that developed between the old mainframe guys and the young distributed guys. There still is that perception out there. The companies that leverage success are those that have closed that chasm. They realize the mainframe is just another component of the larger IT infrastructure."

Crosby and Kahn are among the die-hard group of mainframe proponents who believe the mainframe remains the premier computing platform. "After 45 years," said Kahn, "it is safe to declare that the mainframe is not getting older, it keeps getting better. Not only is it getting better with respect to its prior generations, it remains the paramount computer system, when compared to others."

Comments (6)

	1. 09-14-2009 11:36
	This is a really great, entertaining, well-researched article! Thank you! And it brings back a lot of nice memories as well. Registered

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	2. 09-15-2009 01:49
	very informative article... well researched and written. Registered

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	3. 09-15-2009 11:09
	Thanks for this piece. CA is helping customers continue to take advantage of the mainframe's unique reliability, scalability, security, and cost-efficiency by delivering solutions that empower a whole new generation of IT professionals to manage IBM z/OS environments with their existing Windows and Java skill-sets. Maybe the mainframe is less a dinosaur than it is a phoenix -- rising again with a powerful and compelling value proposition for the future, rather than merely hanging on for survival. Registered

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	4. 09-15-2009 21:00
	Fabulous article, and it's not just because I began my career as a S/370 assembly language programmer. ;) Registered

Fred Kauber

	5. 09-15-2009 23:29
	Good article. Thanks. I started as an IBM punch card operator and still have some IBM brochures for the first System/360 mainframes.    When speaking about technology trends, I like comparisons with the IBM System/370 158, which had 1 million per second (1MIPS) processing capacity and was used as a benchmark for decades. It sold for about $3.5 Million, was liquid cooled, required a raised floor and special air conditioning, was shared by several hundred simultaneous users, and was programmed in Assembler, COBOL, FORTRAN, and PL/I.    Compare that with the Zilog Z8 processor in my Philips Sonicare toothbrush, which is rated at 10 million instructions per second. The embedded processor can execute instructions 10 times faster than a million-dollar IBM mainframe 30 years ago, although they are much simpler instructions (i.e. 8-bit vs. 32-bit and no Floating Point).    But that’s not the whole story. In 30 years, computer form factors have evolved from mainframe & supercomputer to minicomputers, desktop & notebook PCs (personal computers / not shared), handheld PDAs & phones, and now trillions of embedded microprocessors. Registered

Wayne Caswell

	6. 09-17-2009 08:03
	Mike, another well researched and well written piece. I would also support Bob Gordon's observation of "the mainframe is less a dinosaur than it is a phoenix -- rising again with a powerful and compelling value proposition for the future...." by providing the following link to an ongoing discussion in the CIOZone Forum CIO Conversations: The Mainframe Brain Drain…   http://www.ciozone.com/index.php?option=com_fireboard&Itemid=34&func=view&id=358&catid=98    After 11 months, 42 comments and over 36,000 views this thread is still as interesting and as engaging to read through as the day it was started. Perhaps reflecting support for Kahn's observations regarding mainframes getting better, not older. Registered

John Sane

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