Treehouse Software – 40 Years and Still Moving Forward (Part 1)

by Joseph Brady, Director of Business Development and Cloud Alliance Leader at Treehouse Software, Inc. 

Introduction

Many readers know that Treehouse Software has been around since 1983, serving enterprises worldwide with industry-leading software products and outstanding technical support. However, this blog series will dig a little deeper into Treehouse Software’s origins and explore how founder and president, George Szakach blazed a trail from being a systems programmer in the early 60s, to creating and growing his own software company from the early 80s up to the present.

The beginnings… 1960’s.  Moon Landing, Flower Power, the Righteous Brothers, and Punched Cards

George is a Vietnam-era veteran and started working with mainframes in 1960 while in the Army. 

After programming school in Fort Monmouth, NJ, George was assigned to Fort Huachuca, Arizona where he wrote army related applications on the IBM 709.

Before leaving the army in 1963, George had many job offers.  Three years of programming experience was unheard-of back then, so his skillset was very valuable.  He was even offered a job by the president of Informatics, working in Houston at the NASA Johnson Space Center to “put a man on the moon.”  He declined.

Throughout the rest of the 60s, George worked at Burroughs, Univac, and Leasco. During the 70s through 1982, George worked for Ocean Data Systems, Data General, Optical Recognition Systems, Software AG (his longest stint – 7 years), and Superior Oil.

Punched card…

IBM 709 Computer System…

George’s archeological finds from his time at Univac…

With all of this foundational mainframe experience combined with his skills honed at Software AG, the seeds were planted for George’s future: take those roots, move to the trees, and build a house… 

Coming soon… Part 2: Treehouse Software’s first generations.    

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About Treehouse Software

Since 1983, Treehouse Software has been serving enterprises worldwide with industry-leading mainframe software products and outstanding technical support. Today, Treehouse Software is a global leader in providing data replication, and integration solutions for the most complex and demanding heterogeneous environments, as well as feature-rich, accelerated-ROI offerings for information delivery, and application modernization.

Contact Treehouse Software

AWS Services Provide Advanced Monitoring and Analytics of tcVISION’s Mainframe CDC Processing

by Joseph Brady, Director of Business Development and Cloud Alliance Leader at Treehouse Software, Inc.

Many Treehouse Software mainframe modernization customers have requirements for continuous near-real-time replication of mainframe data in order to keep a copy of the data synchronized on the Cloud. These customers are using tcVISION from Treehouse Software for changed data capture (CDC) for this synchronization, which allows changes occurring in any mainframe application data to be tracked and captured, and then published to a variety of AWS targets, including Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3). Some of these customers are also now asking us to recommend the best Cloud-based tools and methods to monitor and gain insights to these complex data processes. Coincidentally, while working with a current tcVISION customer, our technicians are testing out two particularly good, fully managed AWS services that can work hand-in-hand to address this need:

Amazon Athena

Since tcVISION supports Amazon S3 as a target, customers modernizing their mainframe systems on AWS can use Amazon Athena for monitoring and analysis of CDC processing from an S3 bucket.

Amazon Athena is a serverless, interactive analytics service built on open-source frameworks, supporting open-table and file formats. Athena provides a simplified, flexible way to analyze data from an S3 Bucket, as well as many other data sources, including on-premises data sources or other Cloud systems. Athena is built on open-source Trino and Presto engines and Apache Spark frameworks, with no provisioning or configuration effort required.

Figure 1: Example of an Athena query showing bulk-load statistics per table

Amazon QuickSight

Once Athena is setup for monitoring an S3 Bucket, users can easily view their CDC processing and analytics with Amazon QuickSight. QuickSight utilizes advanced machine learning-powered insights and intuitive dashboards, so end users can make the best and quickest data-driven business decisions.

Figure 2: Example of Amazon QuickSight monitoring the throughput of our data to Snowflake

Figure 3: Example of Amazon QuickSight pie chart showing the resulting rows loaded for each Snowflake table:

Figure 4: Example of Amazon QuickSight chart showing statistics for our data bulk-load into Snowflake:

Figure 5: Example of Amazon QuickSight chart showing our load time into Snowflake per table:

View the Amazon QuickSite video here…

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Interested in seeing a live, online demo of tcVISION?

Just fill out the Treehouse Software tcVISION Demonstration Request Form and a Treehouse representative will contact you to set up a time for your online tcVISION demonstration.

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Treehouse Software Salutes Franco Harris

by Joseph Brady, Director of Business Development and Cloud Alliance Leader at Treehouse Software, Inc. 

With the recent passing of Pittsburgh Steelers great running back and Pro Football Hall of Famer, Franco Harris, we would like to revisit April of 1993, when Treehouse Software held an international consultant’s symposium. The symposium brought together attendees and speakers from many consulting and technology companies, and schools from around the world. Since Treehouse Software is located in the greater Pittsburgh area, company president George Szakach was acquainted with Franco and invited him to deliver a fascinating and entertaining address, where he spoke about his career, several business ventures he was pursuing, as well as his budding interest in computer technology.

Franco Harris at Treehouse Software’s Consultant’s Symposium (April 1993)

A few years ago, George reminded Franco about his visit to Treehouse back in 1993. He remembered and they shared some laughs and memories. 

We would also like to mention Franco’s well-known sense of community and accessibility in Pittsburgh. Many staff members have met Franco over the years and have fond memories of his friendliness and willingness to spend time engaging in conversations. Those who come in to the Pittsburgh International airpot can see a sculpture depicting Franco’s famous “Immaculate Reception” from 1972.  Thousands of people, especially recently, have selfies taken with the sculpture. Franco will be missed by his many friends and the community.

Franco Harris sculpture at Pittsburgh International Airport.

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About Treehouse Software

Since 1982, Treehouse Software has been serving enterprises worldwide with industry-leading mainframe software products and outstanding technical support. Today, Treehouse Software is a global leader in providing data replication, and integration solutions for the most complex and demanding heterogeneous environments, as well as feature-rich, accelerated-ROI offerings for information delivery, and application modernization.

Contact Treehouse Software