Old-school programming languages like COBOL are arguably the most significant roadblock between mainframe and SOA harmony. It’s also a far more complicated language barrier than can be solved by simply calling in a translator; effective service management requires that unique developer who’s not just multilingual, but who’s also situationally versed on the company’s business architecture and can deftly navigate the infrastructure’s roadways.
“It’s usually a very small group of people who still know COBOL that are responsible for maintaining the mainframe apps,” says Ron Schmelzer, an analyst with ZapThink. “These people are either still managing it for the company or they’re not even around anymore, and so this stuff is sitting there and literally nobody’s managing it. This code is so legacy it’s untouchable.”
