BOI Customer Cloud
Success Story

Ista AND BOI

Extensive functionalities of a mainframe application on a server system
SUMMARY

Reference data for the control of business processes are an essential element of corporate management at ista. This data is used in countless ista applications. Quality assurance is of great importance especially
when maintaining this reference data.

Since 2008, ista is using BOI software – TABEX4 – on the mainframe to maintain its reference data. As a leading, cross-platform standard software for table access and table maintenance, TABEX4 enables efficient and audit-proof management of reference, control, and parameter data. The user-friendly web interface offers secure data management, even
with complex data organization in the company. Thus, even employees without IT or database knowledge can perform quality-assured, efficient maintenance of all data. At ista, TABEX4 is used to implement e.g. the parameterization of programs, control of automated maintenance tasks and accounting, software access control, and mapping of the corporate structure including address information and teams in an audit-proof,
secure way.

During migration from mainframe to Linux, the TABEX4 installation was also moved to Linux. The project was realized cost- and time-efficient and the previous configuration was retained. Since November 2019, ista‘s reference data are being maintained in SQL databases on Linux by more than 100 professional users – with identical user interfaces and maintenance tasks similar to the mainframe.

ista, a global leading energy service provider, adds sustainable value to buildings for their residents. ista manages data and processes to make buildings climate-friendly, safe and comfortable. As a driver of innovation, ista consistently directs its infrastructure towards the Internet of Things.

  • Employees: over 5.500 in 22 countries(2020)
  • Turnover: EUR 887,8 million (2018)
  • 13 million units with more than 25 million connected devices (2020)

Competent efficiency

With BOI’s competent implementation and support, TABEX4 was successfully migrated from mainframe to Linux in less than three months

Oliver Bilstein Senior | IT Architect & IT Strategy & Architecture Management at ista

The Success Story

Challenges

Migrating the reference data maintenance from mainframe to Linux

For 12 years, ista has relied on TABEX4 for the maintenance of its reference data. With its configurable authorization and client system, TABEX4 enables mapping of the ista-specific organization of data and roles.
In 2018, ista decided to replace the mainframe and operating system z/VSE, and migrate all applications to Linux. At the same time, TABEX4 should be migrated to Linux as well.

ista maintains its reference data in TABEX4 and stores it in the BOI-specific table format. Data is centrally available for high-performance access by
ista applications. For this purpose, the TABEX4 application data was stored on the VSE host. Daily operation, maintenance, and administration
were carried out via the TABEX4 Client/Server System.

An important criterion was that the migration should not result in any changes in the reference data maintenance for the employees in the respective departments. In addition, tight deadlines had to be met. Once again, TABEX4 was able to prove its strengths and enabled a time- and cost-saving migration to Linux.

Goals

Migration of the audit-proof TABEX4 reference data maintenance from z/VSE to Oracle on Linux

The following project objectives were defined:

  • The TABEX4 User Interface for professional users on Linux should be identical to z/VSE. There should be no change in reference data
    maintenance for the more than 100 professional users.
  • The migration effort should be kept as low as possible. Settings and functionalities of z/VSE should be ported to Linux whenever reasonable and applicable. The focus was mainly on the permissions and menu settings, which should ideally be ported without any adaptations.
  • The implementation was time-critical and had to be completed in a few weeks.

Solution

Identical maintenance process for reference data on Linux

TABEX4 Ultimate is platform neutral and thus compatible with many common operating systems. Therefore, TABEX4 can be used not only on the mainframe but also on server systems.

By default, TABEX4 is used with the proprietary table format. With the add-on „Relational Bridge“, all TABEX4 functionalities can also be used for tables from relational databases: „Relational Bridge“ enables the comfortable and audit-proof maintenance of table data from different RDBs with the same TABEX4 User Interface.

Benefit

All project objectives were achieved with the successful migration from z/VSE to Linux-Oracle:

  • TABEX4 continues to be fully used: The TABEX4 User Interface as well as the audit-proof maintenance process are now available on Linux. More than 100 professional users at ista can continue their daily reference data maintenance unchanged. And, the performance for TABEX4 Users even increased.
  • With the identical implementation of z/VSE on Linux, the TABEX4 reference data maintenance can be carried out in the usual quality. Time- and cost-intensive retraining can thus be completely omitted.
  • Migration of the reference data maintenance from z/VSE to Linux was implemented in a time- and cost-efficient way: BOI supported the entire conversion with approx. 25 consulting days. The complete migration was done in less than 2 months.
  • Important tasks were automated to reduce the effort of customizing the TABEX4 maintenance application for ista.
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BOI’s close adherence to schedules and budget made the successful, on-time migration of TABEX4 from mainframe to Linux possible.

Andre Schmidt | Senior Project Manager & Corporate Business Solution at ista

BOI Customer Cloud