Product - Adabas/Natural - Database Migration (SmartDCI)

SmartDCI® – “Ready for the Future”

When it comes to the conflicting priorities of maximum investment protection (of applications and the business processes mapped in them) and the desire for more flexibility, integration, recognized standards and modern or more cost-effective operation, gateways can help protect your existing and tried-and-tested applications while technically adapting them to changed conditions and consolidating the data management within a company.

SmartDCI® – Unrestricted Access for Adabas-C Applications to the Open, Standardized World of Relational Database Management Systems

With SmartDCI®, the transparency gateway for Oracle and DB/2, Adabas C applications can be quickly and securely migrated to relational database systems without having to make any modifications to the their source code.

DB2 or Oracle Instead of Adabas – Simple, Fast and Secure

SmartDCI® is based on the “transparency gateway” technology. The idea behind this is both simplistic and convincing: the database interfaces beneath the applications are swapped.

SmartDCI® – The Principle

Every application based on Adabas C communicates with the database through one single system gateway, the so-called Adalnk. This applies to Natural applications as well as Assembler, Cobol or PL/I apps. These system interfaces are replaced once by SmartDCI®.

(Figure: SmartDCI® architecture)

At runtime, all calls to the Adabas database are taken over by the SmartDCI® middleware – automatically and completely unnoticed by the applications – and sent to the target relational database before the results are returned to the applications in a classical Adabas format. The translation of the data, their structure and formats at runtime are controlled through an internal repository.

Nothing changes for the applications. The Adabas specifics remain just the way they are without having to make any additional adjustments, e.g. ISNs, super and subdescriptors, multiple fields, period groups, etc. In short: On the “outside,” SmartDCI® has the same interface the applications expect, while “underneath,” it’s working together with the new relational database system.

Because the source code remains unchanged and only an access layer has been newly implemented and configured at the system level, only the parity of the results of queries and transactions has to be verified; the logic of the system itself doe not have be     retested.

SmartDCI® – The Goal

In addition to the cost reduction, some other new possibilities also arise after successfully migrating. Where complex, vulnerable interfaces previously had to be manually managed and comprehensive data analyses had to be manually developed, a wide range of tools based on one standardized platform can now be used - from standard tools for data administration to BI software and data warehouses. In addition, the data urgently needed in different applications can be shared and swapped with each other at the database level. New business processes can be developed with new applications and more agile technologies in parallel and based on the same data, and adopt the functions of the legacy applications step-by-step.  And developers, designers and system staff alike will be progressively introduced to the new technologies and development processes.  At the same time, end users’ acceptance of the applications remains as high as ever.

Features and Benefits of SmartDCI®

• Adabas applications are run in an unmodified state in relational database systems
• Support of ISNs, multiple fields, period groups, descriptors, super descriptors, etc.
• No modification of the source code; applications continue to run in an unmodified state
• Independent of the respective programming language
• Little testing effort needed for migration
• Available for mainframe and open systems platforms, for DB2 and Oracle
• Maximum investment protection thanks to unchanged operation of existing applications
• Consolidation of databases throughout the entire company
• Integration of applications through the mutual use of the data basis in a relational database
• Future orientation/sustainability and security thanks to open industry standards
• (DB2, Oracle)
• Independent of Software AG's licensing and maintenance policies