With the heritage of over 40 years of success sustaining the IT infrastructure of companies and organizations throughout the world, the mainframe is today the benchmark by which all other major computing platforms are measured. Despite the abundance of additional platforms that now pervade all organization's IT environments, the mainframe still holds more than 60% of the world's data. Why?
Because of tremendous advances in manufacturing, technology and the embracing of open standards, the mainframe performs better, is more reliable and costs less to support than any other computing platform. So when someone calls the mainframe old and outdated - what are they referring to? They certainly aren't talking about the hardware itself or the state-of-the-art operating systems which drive the hardware. In fact, just about all of the vendors who hawk alternatives to the mainframe actually use "mainframe-class" as the benchmark to compare to their systems, including Oracle, Microsoft, Intel and Hewlett Packard. What is it then that still allows people to talk about the mainframe with nostalgia?
Internet computing is continually transforming the way information is presented, exchanged and used. This means that the interfaces to the mainframe - both the human and computer-to-computer interfaces, are fundamentally changing. And it's those interfaces that have not kept pace with today's de facto standards of internet-based computing, including full web browser visual interfaces and data exchange using Web Services. The mainframe must embody and empower these interfaces; not in a patchwork fashion, but comprehensively, to be accepted by today's demanding class of web-savvy users.
illustro's software solutions help organizations transform their mainframe applications to meet today's business needs. In 2011 illustro became part of UNICOM Global, one of the world's largest private software companies with over 50 divisions world-wide, founded by President and CEO, Mr. Corry Hong.
