MORE ON 3270, FOR YOU HISTORY BUFFS OUT THERE
TN3270, or just plain 3270 as it is commonly called, was created by IBM in 1972. It is a form of dumb terminal,
or display device, usually used to communicate with IBM mainframe systems. Because these displays
typically only showed text in a single color, namely green, they have come to be informally referred to as
green screens. 3270 was somewhat innovative in that it accepted large blocks of data known as datastreams,
which served to minimized the number of I/O interrupts required, making it (at the time) a
high-speed proprietary communication interface.
3270 terminals, the physical entities that is, have not been manufactured for a number of years; however,
the 3270 protocol lives on to this day via emulation packages (Attachmate being a big one in the
business world). Green screens can still be seen around the world though, most notably in call centers of
many large businesses, where they are still the tool of choice . . . some would say tool of inertia. In any case,
they are still used in many places because, ironically, these interfaces tend to be more productive and efficient
than competing (read: web-based) interfaces.
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