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Ah, to be a mainframe programmer
time to read 1 min | 92 words
I had a chat with a pal that works in a company that is slowly (and relucently) moving to .Net. They are moving slowly because they have existing Main-Frame based infrastructure, and they can't figure out why it takes longer to develop an Ajax-Based ASP.Net application over the usual green screen terminals. We spent a lunch discussing the difference between the two styles of development. One is for a static environment, where each of the developers has 15+ years not only as a programmer, but in the business.
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My favorite Main Frame dicsussion was with a couple of developers from a bog Swedish car manufacturer.
This was in 2002 and they where really sceptical about .NET in general. Not so much because of the technology or platform it self, but more about the change it implied. Teh killer comment went something like this:
"The problem is that Microsoft put's out new plattforms all the time, first they told us to use J++, then 5 years later they put out a new technology that replaces J++. I bet that in 5 years they will relase a new version of this .NET with a new approach for everything. Main Frame is a lot better, it never changed"
While he is very correct in his statement, MS do change the recommendations on how to best use technology and put's in a lot of effort to refine their tools, this more demonstrates the mindset of Main Frame developers then a problem with MS strategies.
MF developers don't like to move out of their comfort zone where they have been dwelling for decades and most of them really think that it was "better in the old days".
If the insdustry changes and technology moves forward, some of us move forward with it and try to utilize it to be better at our job. Other just sighs and complains that they now need to change how they develop applications and have to learn new things.
I work at a company that sounds very similar to the company your friend works for - mainframe infrastructure that is moving to .NET very reluctantly.
I agree with everything Patrik said about mainframe developers. They like what they perceive to be stability in the environment as opposed to a new version of .NET coming out every other year. It is very hard to talk to mainframe developers about the flexibility that object-oriented code brings (and I'm not even talking about test driven yet) so that program/project specs can be flexible with the business needs.
And don't even get them started on the flaws of COBOL! My perception is that they just end up pushing away the younger college graduates because they're holding on to 20-30 year old technology.
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