For some, there is a decided effort to remove the mainframe completely from the organization’s IT infrastructure. This involves replacement of the mainframe hardware platform, as well as replacement of all applications currently running on the mainframe, including the business-critical core applications. Applications running on new hardware platforms will have to be able to perform at levels currently provided by applications running on mainframe hardware.

Typically, the reasons are cost savings, but can also be due to the fact that the legacy COTS applications are incomplete, and expensive and difficult (or impossible) to modify. Databases will require conversion as well. Often, the lack of development resources is slowing the migration process. For these organizations, there is no new investment on the mainframe.

Fig 1: Migration

DataKinetics has both product and consulting solutions that help make a complete migration like this as fluid as possible.

tableBASE a mainframe product can be used as the first step in a large-scale migration. tableBASE reduces the cost of running the mainframe—those cost savings can then be applied directly to the migration process.

tableDIRECT, a reference data distribution product, and netTABLES, a distributed systems data manager, are used for the overall distribution and management of the organization’s most mission-critical and oft-accessed reference data.

mainframeDIRECT, an application modernization product, provides the capability for the immediate modernization of mainframe applications, allowing for early acceptance and accelerated training of personnel.

DataKinetics professional services can help with both the interpretation and assessment of existing mainframe applications, as well as preparation, planning and coding of the replacement distributed system applications.