As a generic proxy for the mainframe, COMTI avoids the time and effort required to program a specialized interface with the mainframe. COMTI intercepts object method calls and redirects those calls to the appropriate mainframe program. COMTI also handles the return of all output parameters and return values from the mainframe. When COMTI intercepts the method call, it converts and formats the method's parameters from the representation understandable by the Windows NT platform into the representation understandable by mainframe Transaction Programs (TPs).
All COMTI processing is done on Windows NT Server, and no executable code is required to run on the mainframe. COMTI uses standard communication protocols (for example, LU 6.2) for communicating between Windows NT Server and the mainframe.
A client application uses COMTI to access a TP running on the mainframe. The specific TPs supported in COMTI are IBM's Customer Information Control System (CICS) and IBM's Information Management System (IMS). An example of this type of distributed application might be simply reading a DB2 database on the mainframe to update data in a SQL Server database on Windows NT Server. The following figure shows the simplest COMTI configuration.
The client application can be running on Windows NT Server, Microsoft® Windows NT® Workstation, Microsoft® Windows® 95, or on any other platform that supports DCOM. Because DCOM is language-independent, you can build your client application using the languages and tools with which you are most familiar, including:
That client can then easily make calls to the COMTI Automation object (or any other Automation object) registered on the Windows NT Server.