Not Merely Surviving, the Mainframe is Thriving as the Future of IT
NOVIPRO's Karoline Pierre has seen a lot on her personal journey from Brazil to Canada.
This transcript is edited for clarity.
Reg Harbeck: Hi, I’m Reg Harbeck and today I’m here with Karoline Pierre, who is a z/OS storage management technical support analyst at NOVIPRO. Welcome, Karoline.
Karoline Pierre: Hello. Thanks for having me.
Reg: So let’s start with how you ended up working on the mainframe.
Karoline: It is a funny story, actually. I was lucky to be selected when I finished high school in an IBM program back in 2008. They were looking for young people to start working with the mainframe because—well, they were having issues with people getting retired, and it’s not something that you learn in college. So they were looking for young people to start learning about the mainframe from scratch. So I did this three-month program and I was in love with the mainframe. It was my first contact with the IT world. I was 18 years old. Then I had this amazing opportunity. I started working for IBM and I stayed there until 2016. Then I went back and forth, but that‘s how I got this first contact with the mainframe. That was through this IBM program.
Reg: Now I understand that you didn’t start in North America.
Karoline: No, I didn’t. I started working in Brazil, IBM Brazil, and I lived there until 2023. That’s when I moved to Canada.
Reg: So you spent a few years at IBM Brazil, and I understand that you learned some of your mainframe vocabulary in Brazil and then sort of had to adapt it to North America. One of my favorite systems on the mainframe, of course, is what a lot of our American colleagues call CICS, and I understand that growing up in Brazil you called it something different than a lot of us English speakers call it.
Karoline: We do, we call it Six, which is funny because that’s how we learn it and sometimes when we’re doing calls with support from North America or even from other countries, sometimes they would say CICS. I’ve learned “kicks” as well, but CICS, that’s the one that’s mostly used. And in the beginning I was thinking to myself, but isn’t it Six [laughs]? But yeah, but when I moved here, sometimes in some calls I was about to say Six and then I was, oops, it’s not Six, it’s CICS. If I just randomly say the word six, they won’t understand what I’m talking about. But yeah, it’s very common in Brazil to call it Six.
Reg: Yeah, I have fun with that because I have a lot of Portuguese-speaking colleagues. So now is Portuguese your first language?
Karoline: Yes, yes. I was born and raised in Brazil.
Reg: And now you also speak Canadian French, is that right?
Karoline: I’m learning. It’s a long process since Portuguese, it’s Latin language as much as French. The grammar rules are similar, the pronunciation is completely different, but at least for the grammar rules and some of the phonetics, I’m learning. So I believe that if I was an English speaker, kind of native language, it would be a lot harder, but it’s a process.
Reg: So I’m going to guess you do a lot of your work in English though, but being based in Montreal, is that right?
Karoline: Yes. I live in Montreal and most of our communication with our clients here at NOVIPRO, they’re made in French. So although all of the documentation is made in English, some of our mainframe systems, they are in English. So the first time when I was in the SO and I saw a few things in French, it was weird. I’ve never seen something like that. It’s usually English, and most of our communication with the client is in French. So it’s helped me a lot, but in the beginning, it’s a shock since I spoke English most of my career.
Reg: That’s true. English is sort of the default language for a lot of what happens on the mainframe.
Karoline: Yes.
Reg: So much else culture in around the world, so that’s very cool. So you came with IBM from Brazil to Canada, and at some point you moved over to NOVIPRO. How did that all work?
Karoline: Actually, I was still in Brazil when NOVIPRO reached out. They sent me a message on LinkedIn. I didn’t know the company because it’s a company that is mainly based in Quebec, and I didn’t know much of Quebec. When I start talking to them and I start researching about the company, that’s when I learned that they are basically the main business partner of IBM here in Quebec. And they sell mainframes, they have this mainframe initiative. They’re doing a lot of investments. We were talking and I was very interested. After some interviews I was selected to become a part of the group, so I left Brazil to move to Montreal and start working for them.
Reg: Cool. I understand that part of the NOVIPRO group is an organization called Blair [Technology Solutions], which has joined NOVIPRO. Do you work with Blair as well?
Karoline: I work mainly with NOVIPRO, not as much with Blair. We have a lot of meetings, we gather a lot, but since I work specifically with the mainframe and with z/OS, it’s not something that was part of Blair before they joined the NOVIPRO group. So I still work more for NOVIPRO than Blair.
Reg: And so you have customers now all around both Ontario and Quebec and they’re z/OS customers, is that right?
Karoline: Yes, that’s correct.
Reg: Now I understand that among many other things that you do—you mentioned the storage management, but you’re also doing some mainframe modernization. Obviously that’s a term that people use, mainframe modernization. It’s like cloud computing; it can mean almost whatever you want, and yet it’s important. So how do you see mainframe modernization from the perspective of NOVIPRO?
Karoline: We are doing this extended work, getting certifications and trying to be up to date. Everything that has been happening when it comes to modernization, this is something that I’m really excited to talk about. I went to IBM Dallas last year to be part of a lab that taught us how to operate and to understand more about watsonx Code Assistant for Z. And I was in awe because it was the first time that I actually saw something from the mainframe working outside of mainframe, and seeing COBOL code being transformed into Java and using AI to have an explanation about the code and to get a better understanding of how to make the code work better. So this is something that I think is just amazing, and this is just one example of how getting this next step, to become more up to date and modernized and secure and fast. Because nowadays everything is instantaneous, so you need everything for yesterday. So, when we are using watsonx, and this is our main campaign right now, working with watsonx, and I’m the one doing everything about watsonx Code Assistant for Z, so I’m mainly focused on that, is to get that system that was written in the 1980s, in the 70s, and how do we still use this nowadays, with today’s programs, with today’s APIs, because we have a lot of systems that are talking to each other. So we need the mainframe to talk to other systems as well, not only about mainframe, but other programs. So I believe that that’s how we modernize this system…. Mainframe is not dying, it’s not surviving, it’s evolving. I read it somewhere and I couldn’t agree more. That’s how I believe that IBM is still top of the market when it comes to IT.
Reg: Cool. So basically you’re modernizing the mainframe by building on it in place and not necessarily moving workloads to other platforms… and you need watsonx Code Assistant as part of that. Maybe if you can think of some examples of some of the ways that watsonx Code Assistant really lets you take the functionality that was built in from the beginning, the foundational functionality of an application, and turn it into something that speaks to today’s technologists and today’s users.
Karoline: One of the things that I liked the most when I started studying about the watsonx Code Assistant is the ability to understand the code. When you talk about the COBOL language, people don’t program in COBOL anymore—well, there are still programmers that still do it, but you find new people programming Java or Python or any other programming language because we have a lot in the market. So how can I just get a COBOL code and read it and understand what it’s doing and where it’s connected to the whole program, since we are talking about huge problems. Just to give you an example, a feature that I like the most is the ability to understand and explain the code. You don’t have to create the whole workflow, you just put it there and it’s right in front of you. You know where it’s connected, where it goes, where it’s coming from. I believe that it’s the ability to make a documentation or to explain a part of the code for someone that is joining the team or someone that works there for quite some time but didn’t work on that specific part of the program, they’ll be able to fully understand the whole diagram, the whole program. So I believe that when you save time doing this, when you don’t need a lot of COBOL programmers anymore because it’s all there, I believe that it shows how fast that can be when you create augmentation, when you’re explaining something to someone.
Reg: That’s really cool. For me, one of the areas I’ve been working with for a very long time now is the whole idea of getting a new generation on the mainframe. And of course with about 800 billion lines of COBOL on the mainframes around the world, obviously you may take some of it and move it to new languages like Java or Python, but a whole lot of it you’re also going to just modify in place and most importantly, you’re going to get new people working with it, and they need to understand it. So it sounds to me like this is a great way not just to learn COBOL and not just to learn the applications, but to understand the environment in which those applications are running. So would you say this is a good strategy or part of the strategy for getting a new person ramped up and functional on the mainframe?
Karoline: Yes. Nowadays we have watsonx, we can communicate it between Zowe and you can use Python on Zowe and you can have APIs that will talk directly to the system, and that helps you a lot. So you don’t need to program in COBOL anymore. You don’t have to get rid of your old COBOL code because I know that it scares a lot of people. You’re not changing a production COBOL code in a credit card company just to see if it works. No one do that. And when you’re talking about credit card operations, more than 90% of credit card operations are done in the mainframe. That won’t change and we know that, and it’s not the goal. But we are creating APIs. If we’re creating new calls that would communicate with the COBOL, we can do it through watsonx, we can do it through Zowe. So you can use Java, you can use Python. So I think that’s amazing because that’s connecting what’s new in the market with something that it’s already there for 40 years, 50 years.
Reg: Cool. Now have you had a chance to work much with the application side of things, or are you more focused on the operation and the systems?
Karoline: I mainly focus on the operation. I just make sure that the system’s up and running and the CPU, it’s not getting, reaching 100%—and if it does, I’m the one checking the reason why it’s happening. I’m not a programmer myself. I am very interested in this area so I study a lot—but for fun—because I like to see how it works, but we still didn’t have the opportunity to apply it for the client to start a new project when it comes to watsonx or Zowe. But we are excited and we can’t wait to show the client the power and how it can help and leverage the business for the client.
Reg: Now Zowe is one of those things that—it’s funny, when I first started on the mainframe, we didn’t have any GUIs and then over the next couple of decades, a few of them showed up and people tried stuff and it did and it didn’t work, we tried. And then suddenly along comes Zowe, and all of the major players in the mainframe are not only bought into it but they’ve contributed to it. Just everybody’s getting on board and it’s so interesting. If you’d care to think about it—I mean you probably had to learn 3270 before you learned Zowe, but I sense that you were learning Zowe pretty early on. Maybe you can kind of give a sense of your journey of learning to use and really benefit from Zowe.
Karoline: When I started working with the mainframe back in 2008, we didn’t have any of it. So the first time when I saw, it was basically a black screen with the green letters and that was it. So just the opportunity, the first time that I worked with the z/OS mainframe, and then when I started seeing about Zowe, when I want to start learning about the Zowe, it’s amazing. It’s a web page, so it’s so much more familiar with the people that are starting to work with the mainframe because they’re no longer working with just the black screen, and you don’t know which comment that you’re typing if you don’t know it much. So I believe that since we need new people working for the mainframe, it’s so much easier to make it user-friendly for everyone to see it. If you need something specific from the log, if you need something specific for a program for an application, it’s all there. You can click a button. You never had this on the TSO screen. So I believe it’s amazing because it makes the work a lot easier and a lot faster.
Reg: Now, what are the key compliments to Zowe—that it’s only those of us on the system side that really get to see much of what you mentioned is z/OSMF? How does that kind of fit into that picture?
Karoline: I’ll give you an example that helps a lot. As of now, I’m doing the upgrade from the 2.4 to 3.0, the z/OS upgrade of a system, and we are using Zowe. IBM gives you the whole workflow of what needs to be done in order to upgrade a system. So we never had that in the past. We had to know how to update a system and it changes from client to client. When you’re using the z/OSMF, you have this whole workflow and if you need to run a job, you can run it from there, you can get the output from there. I usually just check on the system just to make sure that it’s all correct because I’m old school, but you don’t even need to go to the system if you don’t want to because it’s basically there for you to just—if I’m running this job or if I’m using this application. So that helps a lot. We don’t update systems. A lot of the times we’re just, well, that’s version for version, but that doesn’t happen every day. So since it’s not an activity that happens every week with every client, when it happens—and sometimes you may forget about, oh, I forgot to run the job, I forgot to check that application. Since you have the whole workflow right there for you, you just click on it. Oh yes, I have to run this job, I have to check this application, I have to check this version, and it’s all there. All the comments are there, all the JCL is there. You can even edit before submitting, or you can just click on a button and it will submit it for you. It don’t have to write anymore. So when it comes to a big project, like a program, like a system update, it’s just amazing how helpful it can be.
Reg: Now, one of the things implicit in what you’ve been saying here is it sounds like you’re using an ISPF an awful lot less than those of us who got formed on it. What are your thoughts about the ongoing role of ISPF? Is it sort of going by the wayside? Does it have a critical role or is it something that you slowly move off of?
Karoline: There are still some functions that we mainly use on the ISPF, but you can just add whatever you need on the z/OSMF. I don’t know if it just because I’m old school—I’m used to using ISPF, so I mainly use it. To be very honest we are using OSMF right now just to work on the system update for the z/OS version update. We mainly use ISPF, but I think that’s just how we learn how to migrate and how to operate a z/OS system. But you can do all those activities within the OSMF. Maybe you’ll have to just adjust some things that you won’t have all the options right there in front of you, but that’s good because when you have a lot of information sometimes it just gets lost. So you can just insert the buttons and insert applications and the activities that you’re actually doing it, so you won’t get confused with a lot of options.
Reg: Cool. Now of course, similar to ISPF and Zowe and z/OSMF, all of this, there’s the whole journey of UNIX-like operating systems showing up on the mainframe. And of course on the one hand there’s USS, which is the first truly POSIX-compliant UNIX, and yet it’s like all EBCDIC. And then on the other hand, you’ve got Linux that’s all over the mainframe. Maybe you can give us a sense of your thought of the roles of USS vs. Linux on the mainframe.
Karoline: Yeah, I think that’s a great example of how we can connect in a system into the mainframe. Because when you think about a new client going to the mainframe, you instantly think, oh yeah, but what codes that they have? Are they coding COBOL? You think of a system that might be older and going to the modernization, but this is not the mainframe. And this is the idea that we want to share with the clients, especially with the new clients, that you can have pretty much any operational system and it can run on the mainframe. So you have the Linux on Z, you have UNIX, you have Red Hat with OpenShift, you have containers, Kubernetes—so it’s all there. It doesn’t matter which kind of operational system that you have—we can operate that somehow on the mainframe. It can be natively, you can be under z/VM, it can be under z/OS, but it’s there and the client doesn’t see anything. It’s not like the client will have to learn this whole new technology because his operational system will be integrated into the mainframe. So I think that’s a great example of how IBM is evolving and bringing all the operational systems together.
Reg: Cool. Now of course one of the ways they’re bringing everything together is with containers, which are now available in more and more different contexts. And of course one of the goals of doing that is to make cloud computing pervasively available, including the mainframe. Maybe if you can give us some thoughts about both containers and the various ways they’re available on the mainframe and how that all contributes to cloud computing—that’s of relevance to your customers.
Karoline: Well, when people talk about cloud, some people don’t actually trust if it’s going to be very reliable or not. Is it going to be fast? My information is going to be out there for everyone to see. But IBM has the most powerful and secure cloud that was ever launched in the market. You have that through containers—your information is saved, and it can be on-prem, it can be on the cloud. I think that’s amazing how IBM can help you find a better way of your business to keep working to continue on that, and we do use containers for that, and I like how it’s all packaged in the solution that you need. Containers do that, and I think that’s just amazing.
Reg: So with all those technological options in advances, I guess the mainframe sure looks like it has a pretty critical role moving forward in the future, for the economy and especially for your customers. Maybe you can talk about what are some of the future roles of the mainframe that relevant specifically to your customers?
Karoline: Well, the goal is not only keep, obviously, our current clients and always helping them to become more modern and to help their business to be more reliable, to be always safe and to help them save money and to help them keep green. Because this is something that I think it’s also amazing about IBM because we’re talking about this power about processing and all that, but we have to remember that you have to keep green. We have to think about our planet. And if you think of the processing of a z16, for instance, you can save up to 75% if you’re comparing to any other server, because you need multiple servers to do the same workload that just one z16 can do. We are talking about billions of operations daily, trillions of operations daily. So I think it’s important to keep green and keep reliable, save money. So when you think about that, you are just thinking about mainframe…. People think that IBM, when you talk about mainframe, oh, we are talking about a lot of money. I have to have this huge company with billions of dollars to have a mainframe, and it’s not like that. If you think about how much you are saving about space and processing and all that, then you see that you’re actually saving money other than just spending a lot of money with a lot of servers. So I believe that it’s educating people because a lot of people don’t know about mainframe. I have a lot of friends that work with other distributed systems, and when we talk about mainframe, there are a lot of things that they don’t know. So I believe that it’s all about educating people and letting them know how IBM and the mainframe will help them with that. And especially now with the z17 that’s mainly focused on AI, the whole processing and all that. I had the opportunity to see it last week. It was just awesome.
Reg: You’ve been really good about showing us how IBM is right at the heart of this, but of course NOVIPRO in Quebec and Ontario—in many ways, on behalf of IBM, but also on behalf of your customers—are also very much at the heart of this. Maybe you could spend some time telling us how this all fits together for NOVIPRO customers, starting with the smallest ones who never realized that they could actually afford a mainframe to the biggest ones who are running parts of the economy. How does NOVIPRO play a key role in all these?
Karoline: Not only in NOVIPRO, but as a NOVIPRO group, and that includes Blair as well. Blair and NOVIPRO bringing them together and showing not only clients from Quebec because NOVIPRO company was mainly in Quebec and now having Blair as part of the group, we have more opportunities now. We have the Toronto market, because Blair is very strong in Toronto. And talking about Canada as a whole, Canada as a country, to bring those small clients, those small business, medium business, show them that they don’t have to be this huge market to be part of this solution. NOVIPRO is doing an awesome job on this. Soon we have this NOVIPRO Academy. We are going to universities and telling young people about the mainframe and educating them and trying to light that fire to think about, wow, maybe I can work with this. Maybe I can take a shot. I remember that when I started working with the mainframe in 2008, people used to tell me, oh, you have to find another job because there won’t be any mainframes anymore in 10 years, in five years. And here I am [laughs] in 2025 still working on this and still talking about the mainframe. And as I said before, the mainframe is evolving. And NOVIPRO actually, we do believe in this. We believe it 100%. So we are doing a lot of investment. We truly believe about the mainframe, and we are doing these campaigns. We are going places: Quebec City, other places of Quebec, but also in other provinces and other places in Canada, trying to bring those new clients and spreading the word of the mainframe.
Reg: I understand that in some sense, NOVIPRO even has a global role. Maybe if you could just give a sense of what is the role of NOVIPRO in the context of the global mainframe?
Karoline: NOVIPRO is today one of the main business partners of IBM in Quebec. Now having Blair with us, that market is open for us in other places. The main role is not only just talking about the mainframe and not just selling the hardware, but selling the products, selling the software. So bringing those clients and showing them that any kind of business can be part of it, and NOVIPRO can help them. We can help you set up an environment or sell you a specific product with a specific API that will help them. And for that, we’re now getting more into the marketing, the style of marketing, of going to places and talking to people, and I believe that that’s the main role of NOVIPRO. Not only keeping our current clients, which they’re very happy and the ones that used to work with the mainframe in the past, but also now attracting those new clients and showing them that any kind of business can be part of our group. And talking about not only NOVIPRO, but Blair as well.
Reg: This has been excellent. Thank you so much, Karoline. Maybe if you can share any closing thoughts you have about the future of the mainframe, Canada and Quebec, NOVIPRO and Blair, and how it all kind of fits together.
Karoline: Well, I think that for last words, I believe that is to keep believing that the mainframe is the future of IT. We still have the best numbers when it comes to security, when it comes to flexibility and to keep your data safe, reliable, and all that. [I believe] that IBM is today being the leader of the market and the business partners and NOVIPRO group as a business partner that we are ready to help any client with any solution that they might need.
Reg: Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Karoline. This has been excellent.
Karoline: Thank you for having me.
Reg: I’ll be back with another podcast next month. But in the meantime, check out the other content on TechChannel. You can also subscribe to their weekly newsletters, webinars, eBooks, solutions directory, and more on the subscription page. I’m Reg Harbeck.