Influential Mainframers
Expertise in a Hoodie: Uwe Graf is The Modern Mainframe Nerd
Uwe Graf Head of ConsultingEasiRun Europa GmbH Hesse, GermanyThis profile features Uwe Graf, one of the top four 2026 Influential Mainframers in the class of 2026.If you ask Uwe Graf to describe himself, he won’t start with a list of certifications or corporate...
Guiding Open Innovation: Rose Sakach and the Evolution of the Modern Mainframe
Rose Sakach Offering Manager, Open Mainframe, Broadcom Burlington, Massachusetts, USAThis piece is part of the 2026 Planet Mainframe Influential Mainframers series.For Rose Sakach, the mainframe’s future is being built in the open. With more than four decades in the...
From New to Z to SME in Under a Year: Meet Stephen Johnston
Stephen K. Johnson Systems EngineerTrident Services, Inc. Chehalis, Washington, USAThis piece is part of the 2026 Planet Mainframe Influential Mainframers series.For over 20 years, Stephen Johnston’s professional world was defined by the fast-moving landscape of...
Connecting the Mainframe to the Web: Sebastian Dewar’s Vision for Accessible Modernization
Sebastian Dewar CTO, Virtel FranceThis piece is part of the 2026 Planet Mainframe Influential Mainframers series.For Sebastian Dewar, modernization is about access. As CTO of Virtel, Dewar has focused his work on one of the most practical challenges facing the...
Defining the Standard: Craig Mullins and a Career Shaping Db2 Expertise
Craig Mullins President & Principal Consultant, Mullins Consulting, Inc. Sugar Land, Texas, USAThis piece is part of the 2026 Planet Mainframe Influential Mainframers series.For Craig Mullins, influence is built through consistency. With more than three decades of...
Scaling Modernization from the Inside: Rosalind Radcliffe’s Work to Make Transformation Real
Rosalind Radcliffe IBM Fellow, CTO, Z Ecosystem, IBM Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USAThis piece is part of the 2026 Planet Mainframe Influential Mainframers series.For Rosalind Radcliffe, modernization is not defined by strategy decks or future-state architecture...
Proving Security at Scale: Ángel Gómez Ruiz and the Shift to Continuous Assurance
Ángel Gómez Ruiz CEO, Bsecure Madrid, SpainThis piece is part of the 2026 Planet Mainframe Influential Mainframers series.For Ángel Gómez Ruiz, security is not just about protection. It is about proof. Over the past several years, Gómez Ruiz has focused on one of the...
Gary Fusco Is Rewriting the Rules Inside the Mainframe
Gary Fusco Senior Vice President for Mainframe Platform, Middleware Engineering, and OperationsM&T Bank Buffalo, New York, United StatesThis profile features Gary Fusco, one of the top four 2026 Influential Mainframers in the class of 2026.The future of the...
Latest
Modernize Security with ACF2 and Top Secret Version17.0
In the world of security, many things have changed since the last release of ACF2 and Top Secret. Credential-based attacks are up - compromised credential-based attacks cost organizations $4.67m annually, while being the initial attack vector 10% of the time¹....
The Need for Effective Change Management
Introduction Over the last few years there has been an ever-increasing number of widely publicised problems involving notable corporate organisations and the failings of their IT systems. Incidents of ransomware, hacking and phishing are becoming worryingly...
Extending the Security Stack: Red Teaming, Scenarios, Risks, and Reality
Mainframes hold the heart of the most critical business processes in finance, healthcare, and government. Yet many security programmes still draw a neat line around them, treating z/OS as out of scope for red teaming, scenarios, and cyber risk quantification. This...
The Open Mainframe Project Has a Trust Problem — And the Mainframe Can’t Afford It
Open Mainframe Project Security Concerns I was chatting with a mainframer buddy the other day, and he expressed some concerns about the overall code security of the Open Mainframe Project (OMP), particularly around member vetting. So, I spent a bit of time digging...
IBM z17 NTS Enhancements: Securing Time Synchronization
In October 2025, Planet Mainframe published the first article of this two-part series on IBM z17 Time Synchronization Enhancements. That article focused on time synchronization resiliency and accuracy enhancements introduced on IBM z17. This article continues with a...
z/OS Security Assessments: What We Missed in 2015 vs. Today
My career has, over the nearly four years of working in this field, predominantly been comprised of RACF Administration and Engineering, interspersed with other opportunities that I foolishly volunteered myself for. Such opportunities have included writing articles,...
PowerTerm End-of-Life: Why Organizations Must Act Now – And Why the December 10 Webinar Is Critical
In March 2025, Ericom PowerTerm, a terminal emulator still used by thousands of organizations to access mainframes, IBM i systems, Unix hosts, VMS machines, and other mission-critical environments, officially entered End-of-Life (EOL). For decades, PowerTerm provided...
Mainframe AI Agents: The Interns Who Never Sleep
A conversation with BMC Anthony Doroand Leah Sokalov.A Knowledge Problem That Can’t Wait Amanda Hendly, Managing Editor of Planet Mainframe, met with Distinguished Engineer Anthony Doro and Senior Product Manager Leah Sokalov, both from BMC. The conversation focused...
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Virtual CICS User Group | May 12, 2026
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Virtual Db2 User Group | May 19, 2026
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Building the CA 7 User Group Together & Technical Sharing Session
Virtual MeetingHelp us set the vision for the new CA 7 User Group! Starting by defining the vision and mission, while drawing on past experiences to build a group that delivers […]
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Building the ESP User Group Together & New ESP Web Client Deep Dive
Virtual MeetingHelp us set the vision for the new ESP User Group! Starting by defining the vision and mission, while drawing on past experiences to build a group that delivers real […]
❓Linux: Tux in the Data Center
Our quiz today focuses on Linux, which Linus Torvalds originally created in the early 90s for x86 desktop hardware—about as far from a mainframe as you can get. But its life on mainframes has proved remarkably powerful. Through the mid-to-late 90s, Linux gradually...
NEWS – AI to Mainframe Modernization, Shaping the Future of Enterprise Computing, and more
U.S. Public Sector Applies AI to Mainframe Modernization IBM Announces Strategic Collaboration with Arm to Shape the Future of Enterprise Computing 21CS Establishes Strategic Partnership with Interskill Learning IBM Expands FedRAMP Portfolio with Authorization of 11...
❓ Influential Mainframer Trivia: Eleanor Kolchin
For the month of April, Planet Mainframe puts the spotlight on influential mainframers, and this week our trivia quiz is all about mainframe trailblazer Eleanor Kolchin. Kolchin built her career at a pivotal moment in computing, when computing machines were...
NEWS – Introducing IBM’s New SQL Tool, Virtel 4.64 now Available, and more
Bringing AI to Mainframe Data: Introducing IBM SQL Data Insights Pro Virtel 4.64 Now Available: Stronger Session Security, Enhanced Japanese Codepage Support, and Key Usability Improvements BMC Advances Trusted AI Orchestration With New Control-M Kyndryl awarded a...
❓Influential Mainframer Trivia: Bob Evans
At Planet Mainframe, April is dedicated to honoring influential mainframers past and present. This week’s quiz dives into the life and times of Bob Evans (1927–2004), who played a central role in shaping modern enterprise computing during his career at IBM. ...
NEWS – Kyndryl Readiness Report, Precisely and Matillion Partnership, and more
Kyndryl Readiness Report reveals misalignment between infrastructure investment and preparedness for converging modernization demands Precisely and Matillion Partner to Accelerate Data Modernization and Agentic AI Readiness IBM Completes Acquisition of Confluent,...