Do you think User experience and user interface are the same? If you do, you are not alone. However, in reality they are very different. According to Nielsen Norman Group, 'user experience' includes all the aspects of the interaction between the end-user with the company, its services, and its products. Likewise the Db2 user experience transformation is a lot more than a new user interface. Lets discuss a few key aspects here.
Technology transformation is a constantly evolving process. Im sure you all agree that technology has come a long way from the time the first computing devices were invented. In the recent times, the speed at which the technology around us is evolving is rapid. Mainframes have always been at the forefront of technology and has evolved tremendously over the last 60 years.
If you have not had a chance to read Akiko Hoshikawa’s wonderful blog on Mainframe s 60th birthday, I would definitely recommend you take a few minutes to do so.
With the evolution of core capabilities, the ability to access and use those capabilities with ease have also been evolving. Isn’t it fascinating to think that Mainframes have seen 3-4 generations of individuals already and are very well set for many more. With each new generation, the expectations around user experience have also been changing.
While there are so many initiatives in this space, I will shed more light into how we are re-defining user experience around Db2 and the entire ecosystem. Im certain, many of you will be able to relate to the purpose and need.
Let us start with the most popular one - Data Studio. My colleagues Jane Chan, Kevin Poole and myself discussed this very topic last week on a webcast.
No doubt, Data Studio was very well adopted. However when it relates to Db2 for z/OS , even starting with v12, there was no new-function exploitation. When Db2 v12 was made generally available, I recall a lot of conversations around when to expect new engine capabilities to be included in Data Studio. With the wealth of functional capabilities going into Db2, lack of functional exploitation of key capabilities is un-acceptable to our users.
4 years ago we embarked on the mission to re-think the overall administrator and application developer experience and understand how to bring Db2 to our end users.
The market analysis of all application development tools showed a preference for VS Code, irrespective of the code language being used. To make it easy, we built the Db2 Developer Extension for z/OS for VS Code in 2020. The key capabilities were prioritized with the help of customers participating in the Early adopter program and the rich functional base continues to grow and expand to exploit new Db2 v13 capabilities and enable organizations migrate successfully from Data Studio.
Similarly in the database administration space, we delivered the first version of Db2 Administration Foundation for z/OS in June 2021 on the Zowe infrastructure. Im sure many of you are wondering, Why Zowe? One of the biggest and loudest requests we had from our z/OS customers over the years was the need to have a native z/OS solution for administering z/OS software. Zowe is just that. It has a very flexible architecture that can be adapted to how organizations adopt Zowe. Also, it has gone through multiple rounds of enhancements and updates since its first release and is only getting better by the day. We’re constantly improving the install and usage experience for Zowe and Db2 Administration Foundation to make sure we do everything to make this a smooth transition experience for our customers.
One of the other key aspects of this transformation is really future-proofing the building blocks. We’re all well aware that technology surrounding application development and deployment is changing every few months. When DevOps became an expectation, we realized that a lot of the building blocks esp. in relation to tooling, were not easy to adapt to that kind of hands off workflow setup. We took the opportunity as part of this effort to re-think the foundations and to make some fundamental changes to the backend functionality to API enable them to allow not just for traditional User interfaces to consume but also for pipelines where a certain workflow needs to be executed in a no-human-in-the-loop model.
We all understand that no change is ever easy for everyone. However, there is no progress without change.
Adoption of newer ways of working in the ever changing technology space is essential for businesses for a successful future. While migration to the newer products in the context of Db2 administration and application development is necessary, I want to assure that the team and I are constantly looking into areas of improvement with every conversation we have with our wonderful group of trusting customers.
Also, one key aspect of this is the way we view platform security. At IBM, we have a security by default mandate. This means that all IBM software need to undergo rigorous security checkpoints and ensure no outside-in (and even within the platform) communication allows for exposures. We understand that security is key to our customers and we want to make sure there are no holes.
I’ve had a lot of conversations around how some of the security setup makes it complicated to roll out products. Although security configurations and parameters are still not well understood and we’re making every effort to make it easy, the landscape here has drastically changed in comparison with 10 years ago.
Whats next? Near term, we want every one of our Db2 customers to start (if not already) tool migration planning to support Db2 v13 and beyond, alongside Db2 v13 migration planning. Data studio support will end March 2025. Data Server Manager, for those of you who use it, ended support for Db2 for zOS in March 2024 and for Query workload tuner customers, will end December 2024.
We’ve been broadcasting messaging regarding these since 2022 and I want to make sure we work together to come up with a plan to suit your organizations needs to adopt the new tooling.
Long term, there is so much activity in this space that is transforming the way users interact with mainframes in general and Db2 for zOS specifically with Ansible-first automation strategy, increased focus on DevOps on z/OS, Cloud provisioning, use of Generative AI, simplifying system maintenance, etc. Organizations around the world are transforming. Skill sets and expectations are shaping the way technology is being used as an enabler to run successful businesses. IBM s been at the forefront of this for 100+ years, mainframes for 60+ and Db2 for 40+. We will continue to embrace responsible technology to ensure success for the future of the mainframe and Db2 and most importantly of our customers who are invested in us.
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