Hucke AG Group is one of the leading fashion companies in Germany and is represented in over 30 countries worldwide. Hucke AG is one of the few fashion companies that offers design and manufacturing of fashion for women, men and kids at an economical price.
The hub of the central data processing for Hucke AG is theIBM 9672-RB4 which runs with VM andVSE/ESA 2.3.2 with their operationaldatamaintained in a DATACOM database.Several factors caused Hucke AG tolook to integrating Client/Servertechnology withthe traditional mainframebaseddata processing. These included:continuous requirements for implementationand usage of new technologies, alternatives to the existing data processinginfra-structure, anddemands to reduce costs.
The goal was to develop WINDOWS based applications using object-oriented knowledge while accessing the traditional data structures stored on the mainframe. Hucke AG made several attempts in this direction, but was not successful because of performance problems with the connectors available for the DATACOM database.
After a demonstration andtrialinstallationof tcACCESS, the DATACOM database was accessedfrom a MS-ACCESS application usingthe tcACCESS ODBC connectivity. Duringthis trial period, a Visual Basicapplication was developed which processesa billof material information storedina DATACOM database while allowingusers to update the database.
During the four-week trial period, Hucke AG found various areas where tcACCESS would be a perfect fit. For instance, a Visual Basic application was developed which directly accessed VSE POWER Queues and provided a selective download of multiple reports of the POWER PRINT Queue. The Visual Basic program uses tcACCESS to download mainframe reports and convert them into MS-WORD format. This application was then handed over to the end-user department, which was using manual procedures to perform the same task.
After a more than positive impression, the decision was made by Hucke AG to purchase tcACCESS. "To ensure a smooth and easy implementation of tcACCESS, we developed a few REXX procedures which automatically generated the necessary tcACCESS table definitions for the DATACOM databases," stated Heinrich Hageboeke, DATACOM administrator at Hucke AG. "In the meantime this is obsolete, because tcACCESS automatically reads the DATACOM dictionary to obtain all relevant information."
In the first few months of production use, additional applications were developed which use tcACCESS to directly access mainframe resources. "It is a lot of fun to work with tcACCESS," replied Bernd Spechtmeyer, Application Programmer at Hucke AG. " I personally do not have a mainframe background, but I can use my knowledge of object oriented programming to develop applications which transparently access mainframe data. ODBC is the key to success and my day-to-day business!"
Bernd Spechtmeyer recently developed an application that utilizes the production bill of material data, which resides on a mainframe DATACOM database and merges this data with graphical objects of the products stored on a MS SQL-Server database.
"We are currently planning to enhance this application and web-enable it."
said, Alfred Bartels, Manager of Application Development of Hucke AG. "This will be easy to do because tcACCESS will be used to connect the Web application and our VSE System."
