Transnet IT disaster looming

Hanno Labuschagne

Hanno Labuschagne

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Transnet IT disaster looming

A fight between South Africa's rail, port, and pipeline company, Transnet, and its hosting provider, Gijima, could result in the former's operations coming to a standstill.

According to Gijima's court documents, seen by City Press, Transnet's operations could be rendered dysfunctional if it doesn't find another service provider to store key operational information.
 
F it gijima, been here done that, Gladly cancel it and give them "the keys". They will come with their begging bowls after they realise they dont have a clue. Then double the price.

After they realise they dont know know the difference between a network cable and a car bonnet.

A "username and a password do not a system make"
 
PCWARITM said:
“Our contract management in this place, excuse my French, is kak. It is kak. It is terrible.”

Sounds like great professional boardroom talk.

But seriously... they have mainframe based systems. Come on. Time to move away from that bloated overpriced dinosaur.
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Many companies still run mainframes for very good reasons..

Doubt transnet is running a mainframe though, but that would be indicative of the idiots running the show to reference it as such.
 
PCWARITM said:
I'm aware of that, though good reasons usually involve someone trying to stay relevant or keep their job. I just don't see a use case for them in a new business given the progress of PC and cloud based systems. Migration is probably money better spent.

It's in the article. They don't own the infrastructure as far as I can tell, it's the provider.
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Just cos you don't see it as a use case doesn't mean there isn't a very valid one that exists to the point that ibm is still building brand new mainframes.
 
Why do I get the feeling after reading the article... that the "internal staff" would be the T-Systems okes...?
 
R13... said:
Mainframe computer? What the ****?
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IBM (mostly) stuff that just doesn't break, and if it does you can swop parts while its running. Uptime is in the > 99.9999% (for a single server!) without needing a cluster / replication.

Id say just vastly over-engineered, nowadways out shadowed by using high availability on cheap stuff.
 
bixt said:
IBM (mostly) stuff that just doesn't break, and if it does you can swop parts while its running. Uptime is in the > 99.9999% (for a single server!) without needing a cluster / replication.

Id say just vastly over-engineered, nowadways out shadowed by using high availability on cheap stuff.
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It's interesting that transnet outsourced so much of their IT. Companies usually control security internally even when they outsource their IT. Like active directory control would require internal people approval even if external people do admin and some maintenance but they tend not to have access. Wouldn't be surprised that transnet have no idea what's in their control and what's not.
 
PCWARITM said:
I'm aware of that, though good reasons usually involve someone trying to stay relevant or keep their job. I just don't see a use case for them in a new business given the progress of PC and cloud based systems. Migration is probably money better spent.
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They're definitely relevant in a lot of transaction stuff, you will definitely not be able to handle as many transactions as it does, there's just so much optimization there.

And I would expect Transnet to just keep using them, the software is tried and tested, rewriting for the sake of moving away from a mainframe for "savings" in I don't know how many years doesn't really make sense vs risk.

That's not to say they shouldn't try and add new stuff that's not on a mainframe, but stuff like sorting out/calculating schedules/route timetables is all very relational, transaction based, perfectly fine mainframe use case. Can't say more without knowing volume.
 
ToxicBunny said:
Many companies still run mainframes for very good reasons..

Doubt transnet is running a mainframe though, but that would be indicative of the idiots running the show to reference it as such.
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They certainly did in the 90's. When I left in 1994 they were still at it and it was working, doing exactly what it was installed for, and all managed and maintained in-house at the time.

I guess they chased away the competent IT-people and replaced them with outside contractors - an own-goal if you ask me.

Johnatan56 said:
They're definitely relevant in a lot of transaction stuff, you will definitely not be able to handle as many transactions as it does, there's just so much optimization there.

And I would expect Transnet to just keep using them, the software is tried and tested, rewriting for the sake of moving away from a mainframe for "savings" in I don't know how many years doesn't really make sense vs risk.

That's not to say they shouldn't try and add new stuff that's not on a mainframe, but stuff like sorting out/calculating schedules/route timetables is all very relational, transaction based, perfectly fine mainframe use case. Can't say more without knowing volume.
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Crucial to Transnet Operations, be it Spoornet or Portnet - Train timetables, manifests, destination/route-planning, container movements, Locomotive, carriage and wagon inspections/maintenance, etc, etc. all managed via mainframe.

Contracting out the heart of your management system is nothing short of suicide, akin to remove your brain and giving it to a doctor to manage your bodily functions on your behalf, but here we are. VIVA ANC, VIVA!
 
PCWARITM said:
Sure, in a centralized environment though one could argue for distributed systems.

Absolutely, it's not an easy shift, but let's face it, the risk overhead is demonstrated nicely right here.

I just feel like Mainframe is very risky today.
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It absolutely is not risky at all.

It's the opposite. It's the safe, expensive, enterprise class choice.
 
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