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                  IBM said the z13's, targeted at mid-size organizations and described as the new entry point for the company's z Systems, has an "updated cryptographic and tamper-resistant hardware-accelerated cryptographic co-processor cards with faster processors and more memory," allowing clients to process twice as many high-volume, cryptographically protected transactions as before without compromising performance.

                     The company is also packaging with the mainframe threat monitoring based on behavior analytics and multi-factor authentication at the z/OS operating system level, and has also announced more independent software vendors that have integrated their software applications with the z Systems under IBM's partnership program called "Ready for IBM Security Intelligence."

             The multi-factor authentication for z/OS, the first time such authentication has been integrated into the OS rather than offered as add-on software, requires privileged users to enter a second form of identification like a PIN or randomly generated token to access the system.

                  The z Systems Cyber Security Analytics offering, being developed by IBM Research, learns user behavior and alerts administrators if it detects unusual patterns on the platform.

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Two Mainframe Models

Two mainframe models:-

                Mainframes are available with a variety of processing capabilities to suit the requirements of most business organizations. In the case of IBM, for example, each mainframe model provides for sub-capacity processors from granular processing requirements up to the full range of high-end computing.

Let’s look at two entries from IBM (Figure 1-3):

• System z Business Class (BC)
• System z Enterprise Class (EC)

Fig:-System z  Business and Enterprise class

                       The System z Business Class (BC) could be said to be intended for small to mid-range enterprise computing, and delivers an entry point with granular scalability and a wide range of capacity settings to grow with the workload. The BC provides for a maximum of up to 10 configurable PU-s.

                      The BC shares many of the characteristics and processing traits of its larger sibling, the Enterprise Class (EC). This model provides granular scalability and capacity settings on a much larger scale and is intended to satisfy high-end processing requirements. As a result, the EC has a larger frame to house the extensive capacity that supports greater processing requirements. The EC offers up to 64 configurable CP-s.

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Factors Contributing to Mainframe Use

Factors contributing to mainframe use:-

                         The reasons for mainframe use are many, but most generally fall into one or more of the following categories:

• Reliability, availability, and serviceability
• Security
• Scalability
• Continuing compatibility
• Evolving architecture
• Extensibility
• Lower total cost of ownership (TCO)
• Environmental friendliness

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Old and New Mainframe

Old and New Mainframe:-

                    A highly secured computer system designed to continuously run large, mixed workloads at high levels of utilization while meeting user-defined service level objectives.
                    Early mainframe systems were housed in enormous, room-sized metal boxes or frames, which is probably how the term mainframe originated. The early mainframe required large amounts of electrical power and air-conditioning, and the room was filled mainly with I/O devices.
Starting around 1990, mainframe processors and most of their I/O devices became physically smaller, while their functionality and capacity continued to grow. Mainframe systems today are much smaller than earlier systems, and are about the size of a large refrigerator.
                   In some cases, it is now possible to run a mainframe operating system on a PC that emulates a mainframe. Such emulators are useful for developing and testing business applications before moving them to a mainframe production system.

                                    Fig:- Old and New Mainframe        

Physical characteristics of a system:-

• Compatibility with System z operating systems, applications, and data.
• Centralized control of resources.
• Hardware and operating systems that can share access to disk drives with other systems, with automatic locking and protection against destructive simultaneous use of disk data.

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Introduction Of Mainframe

Mainframe computers ("big iron") are computers used primarily by large organizations for critical applications, bulk data processing such as census, industry and consumer statistics, enterprise resource planning, and transaction processing. It is the high performance computer supporting multiple user at the same time. It provides the high security and processes the millions of data.

Mainframe can use for:-

• Reliability:- System can recover from failure 
• Availability : - Recover data or component without affecting other programs. 
• Serviceability:- System itself find what has been wrong and give message 
• Scalability:-Upgrading to high configuration Security Compatibility

Classification of Computer:-

Computers are broadly classified into 4 types i.e

Microcomputer (Personal Computer) :

A microcomputer is the smallest general purpose processing system. The older pc started 8 bit processor with speed of 3.7MB and current pc 64 bit processor with speed of 4.66 GB. Examples: - IBM PCs, APPLE computers Microcomputer can be classified into 2 types :

1. Desktops 
2. Portables

The difference is portables can be used while travelling whereas desktops computers cannot be carried around.The different portable computers are: -

• Laptop 
• Notebooks 
• Palmtop (hand held) 
• Wearable computers

Minicomputer:

A minicomputer is a medium-sized computer. That is more powerful than a microcomputer. These computers are usually designed to serve multiple users simultaneously (Parallel Processing). They are more expensive than microcomputers. Examples: Digital Alpha, Sun Ultra.

Mainframe computers: -

Computers with large storage capacities and very high speed of processing (compared to mini- or microcomputers) are known as mainframe computers. They support a large number of terminals for simultaneous use by a number of users like ATM transactions. They are also used as central host computers in distributed data processing system. Examples: - IBM 370, S/390.

Supercomputer: -

Supercomputers have extremely large storage capacity and computing speeds which are many times faster than other computers. A supercomputer is measured in terms of tens of millions Instructions per second (mips), an operation is made up of numerous instructions. The supercomputer is mainly used for large scale numerical problems in scientific and engineering disciplines such as Weather analysis. Examples: - IBM Deep Blue.

Characteristics of Multi-programming:-

• Multiple virtual storage 
• Multi-programming SPOOL(Simulator Peripheral Operation Online) 
• Batch Address Space DAT(Dynamic Address Transaction )

Mainframe include the important concept:-

• COBOL 
• VSAM 
• CICS 
• JCL 
• DB2

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