Modern Mainframe Development

Preface

Digital transformation is the main driver for global enterprises. According to software company ServiceNow, businesses will spend a staggering $7.4 trillion on digital transformation during the next three years. A key reason is that larger enterprises need to remain competitive and relevant. Otherwise, relentless disruption will occur.

Yet true digital transformation does not mean ripping out mainframes and other legacy systems. This would be extremely expensive and risky. Besides, mainframes have major advantages. They can process huge amounts of information and allow for highly secure processing, which are essential for large enterprises. Many of these transactions are mission-critical, such as those for banking, insurance, and energy.

In the years ahead, the main strategy for digital transformation will be to pursue a hybrid approach. Traditional mainframes and applications will integrate with modern systems. Developers will need to have a solid understanding of mainframe architectures and ecosystems. This will allow for creating systems that get results and make an impact on the organization.

What’s Covered

The topic of mainframe development is expansive. To help readers better understand this, I divided the book into two parts:

Part I

This part covers traditional aspects of mainframe development. We’ll delve into details of the COBOL language as well as how to run programs with Job Control Language (JCL). We’ll also look at the main databases for the mainframe—​Db2 ...