OpenLegacy Partners With Compuware to Advance DevOps on Mainframes

OpenLegacy has allied with Compuware to make it easier to build and debug microservices-based applications employing REST application programming interfaces (APIs) to access data residing on mainframes.

Zeev Avidan, chief product officer for OpenLegacy, said the company’s namesake platform analyzes mainframe environments to create microservices-based APIs written in Java without requiring any changes to the legacy environment. That approach not only minimizes disruption to the mainframe environment, but it also eliminates the need to rely on enterprise service bus (ESB) platforms and legacy web services interfaces to access mainframe data, he said.

The alliance with Compuware now makes it easier access the OpenLegacy platform from within Topaz Workbench, a set of tools from Compuware that are used to apply DevOps practices to applications that either run on a mainframe or need to access data residing on a mainframe.

Avidan said it is becoming increasingly common for organizations to want to build and deploy applications that need to access mainframe data as part of various digital business transformation initiatives. The challenge they face is that most legacy monolithic applications running on a mainframe don’t have an API to invoke. OpenLegacy provides a framework for generating those APIs, which in turn makes it easier to incorporate mainframes within the context of a larger DevOps process. The alliance with Compuware furthers an ongoing effort by the two companies to foster the adoption of best DevOps processes in mainframe environments, he said.

Legacy waterfall-based application development processes are still relevant in mainframe environments, he added, but it’s also clear organizations want to apply DevOps processes to applications spanning hybrid environments that include mainframes. The majority of data in many enterprise IT environments is created on a mainframe. Rather than being forced to copy that data, API platforms such as OpenLegacy make that data more accessible where it resides. Once the APIs are in place, it becomes practical for DevOps teams to create software development kits (SDKs) to access various applications running on mainframes, Avidan said.

Organizations that have invested in mainframes generally are interested in agile development methodologies that enable them to derive more value from those investments. The challenge they face is finding a way to make that data available in a way that doesn’t disrupt the mission-critical applications running on the mainframe, he said. Over time, IT organizations running mainframes will adapt their processes to incorporate best DevOps practices, but the level of disruption they can embrace in pursuit of that goal has to be minimized, Avidan noted, adding it would be unreasonable to expect that level of cultural change to occur overnight.

Despite ongoing predictions about the eventual demise of the mainframe, the number of workloads running on the venerable platform continues to increase, thanks in part to the ability to run Linux on a mainframe. What many organizations that opt to run Linux on a mainframe don’t always initially appreciate is the degree to which that decision also opens the door to transforming their internal IT culture, regardless of whether they are ready.

— Mike Vizard