IBM brings AI assistant to mainframe, promises Linux version

The IBM mainframe is the latest platform to gain a generative AI-based assistant to simplify automation and help customers with routine tasks. IBM rolled out its new watsonx Assistant for Z v1, which will tie together automation coding and watsonx AI technology to ease mainframe operations.

“Users can seamlessly import existing trusted automation created with Ansible, job control language (JCL), and REXX as skills into the product catalog,” wrote Parul Mishra, vice president, product management with IBM Digital Labor, and Skyla Loomis, vice president, IBM Z Software, in a blog about the new assistant.

“These skills can be invoked via a contextually aware chat experience, using watsonx Orchestrate’s extensible automation framework that improves productivity and accelerates efficiency on the mainframe,” they wrote. WatsonX lets customers build and manage AI resources and workflows.