When you first meet Frank Kyne, you’ll ask to be forgiven for parroting back “Kind.” While you’d be wrong about the spelling, you’d be right about Frank’s personality. Next, you might notice his accent – it’s clearly Irish. Except that he was born in the Bronx, New York, living there for more than a decade before moving to Ireland.
Many know of Frank Kyne, but we’ve been honored to really get to know him since he joined the Planet Mainframe team in September 2024, a treasured benefit of acquiring Cheryl Watson’s Tuning Letter. With Frank comes a lifetime of experience for us all. Or maybe two lifetimes as he jokingly refers to himself as ‘nearly 200 years old.’
His specialty is mainframe systems programming, with a career that includes working at banks, in consulting, and a prodigious 30 year tenure at IBM. After IBM, Kyne joined Watson & Walker Inc as President and Editor of the Tuning Letter, eventually evolving into the primary author, taking over the helm from the founder Cheryl Watson.
Frank is an archivist of sorts – he has seen tremendous changes in technology since his first mainframe interview left him wondering what a computer was — and every quarter for more than 10 years, he has shared his vast knowledge with us.
In celebrating Kyne as the newest staff member at Planet Mainframe, we wanted to share the person behind his lengthy and laudable CV. What do you know about Frank? Read on.
How do you take your coffee — or tea?
With anything that is bad for me — cream, sugar, you name it.
Are you a pet person?
Oh yes, my wife and I have a golden retriever named Milo. The picture was taken on his school bus on the way home from puppy kindergarten.
What’s a good book or movie you might suggest?
A good book would be the ‘IBM z16 Technical Guide’ (August 2024 edition). And a good movie is probably ‘Harvey,’ with Jimmy Stewart.
Are you a details person, or more of a big picture guy?
My kids say, ‘I’d never work for you! You’re so pedantic and fussy about things!’ I guess that answers the question.
A food you’re always in the mood for is…
All the essential food groups — cider, ice cream, and chocolate.
What’s new in the mainframe world?
Well, ‘new’ in mainframe is different than ‘new’ in Windows. Windows means today; that’s not true in mainframe. ‘New’ for us is gaining 10% faster processing speeds or digging into every IBM z/OS upgrade.
What do you think about AI and the mainframe?
Everything from a toothpick to a supercomputer is AI today. I asked a bank recently if they had any interest in AI at their company. They laughed and said, ‘We have fraud detection and it works. I have 100 other things users want, so why would I take something that’s working and make it work a tiny bit faster?’ But I do think there is huge potential for gathering brand new insights from SMF data. There are hundreds of thousands of SMF fields with correlations that we would never even imagine — AI would be ideal for uncovering those relationships. And it would deliver experience, skills, and real business value, and hopefully open minds to other uses of AI on the mainframe.
Everything from a toothpick to a supercomputer is AI today.
What’s the goal of the Tuning Letter?
No one can be an expert in everything mainframe; it’s too big for anyone to know all of it. We write and describe each topic so that anyone in mainframe can read it and understand it, even if it’s not their area of expertise. We want a reader to be able to sit in a meeting and not look like a deer in the headlights.
What do you enjoy doing for fun?
Hmmm, sleep? Some people can have a real work-life balance; I’m abysmal at it. I work until I’m done. I have loads of interests but no hobbies. I like volunteering helping animals.
I hear you are attempting semi-retirement in the first quarter of 2025. What are your plans?
I hope to not be bored. To be fair, I don’t know if I like being bored or not — I haven’t experienced it! I can’t imagine having the time to be bored, but I’d like to give it a shot.
How do you decide what to put in the Tuning Letter?
I usually start with a vague idea of what should be in an issue. Then I collaborate with a number of people who work on articles. Along the way I’ll go back for questions and review with them. Generally, I want the Tuning Letter to provide info that can’t be found elsewhere — covering areas such as redbooks, hardware, ops, transactions, database, automation, and storage.
Over the years I made a lot of contacts, and I receive invaluable input from them for each issue. There is a community around the Tuning Letter.
I’ve been lucky. After 147 years, I’m still learning something new every day.
Do you have any superhero powers?
If I do, no one has told me about them yet, so they must be super-secret.
Want to experience what it’s all about? Subscribe to Cheryl Watsons’ Tuning Letter
Penney Berryman, MPH (she/her), is the Content Editor for Planet Mainframe. She also writes health technology and online education marketing materials. Penney is based in Austin, Texas.
Connect with her on LinkedIn.