How do we rate the capacity of IBM System Z mainframe hardware? Well, these days, IBM publishes the capacity rating of every mainframe that they sell in MSUs, not MIPS. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. When people discuss mainframe capacity, they often talk in terms of MIPS. But what does MIPS mean? And […]
Many organizations’ modernization plans become “the best-laid plans of mice and men.” Plans that are easily waylaid by organizational or business distractions become convenient excuses for postponing IT modernization projects. This is especially true during times of economic downturn and the potential of a recession. Many times, the “problem” is more one of friction that […]
There are many reasons for tuning your mainframe applications. Surely the most important reason is to provide faster access to your end users. The quicker an application responds, the happier the people that use it will be. But a close second is likely to be cost reduction. Unfortunately, tuning to achieve cost savings is frequently […]
Cost containment is an important criterion for IT departments as organizations everywhere embrace financial austerity. Every decision regarding your computer resources is weighed based on not only the value that it can deliver to your organization, but upon the cost to procure, implement, and maintain. And in most cases, if a positive return on investment […]
Over the last several decades, I have spoken to many organizations about their mainframe application “modernization plans.” Many claim to HAVE plans, but few report any progress toward completion! Why is that? Why are modernization plans so difficult to start and complete? Perhaps it’s best summarized in the line from a Robert Burns poem – […]
When it comes to exploiting the zIIP specialty processor, a lot of attention is paid to distributed Db2 SQL requests, and rightly so. Distributed SQL issued against Db2 is one of the largest opportunities for reducing stress on general purpose processors. Indeed, most modern applications that access Db2 data do so using dynamic SQL using […]
Mainframes continue to be viable for enterprise computing due to their inherent capabilities for supporting the most critical business functions. When it comes to supporting large volumes of data, high-speed transaction processing, and secure computing the mainframe continues to excel. The Fortune 1000 relies upon mainframes to run their business, and of course, much of […]
Today’s article in my series on zIIP processors will be a little different because I want to focus on a specific IBM mainframe pricing model and how users of that model may benefit from using zIIPs. The pricing model, Tailored Fit Pricing (TFP), is the latest model introduced by IBM. But what is TFP, and […]
Your organization has taken the leap and chosen to modernize your existing COBOL monoliths into Java-based application services, ready for the cloud. Your team plots out a journey toward success. Rather than taking a risky big-bang approach, each incremental release on the road toward modernization is prioritized and scheduled to save costs and capture value […]
Over the past few months, I’ve written about the current state of specialty processors for IBM Z mainframes with a particular concentration on the zIIP. We looked at what they are, how they work, and why you might want to consider exploiting them. But in this article, I want to ruminate on the potential of […]
Recent Comments