In the quiet corners of corporate data centers and deep within the veins of many global enterprises, legacy systems still hum steadily—faithfully powering critical operations. Systems like AS400 mainframes, often decades old, continue to drive processes in finance, retail, healthcare, and more. They’re reliable. They’re proven. But they’re also… hard to automate.
These systems weren’t built with modern automation in mind. Interfaces are text-based. Inputs are rigid. Integrations? Practically non-existent.
So when businesses set out to digitize and scale, they often hit a wall:
“How do we bring our legacy infrastructure into the future—without rebuilding everything from scratch?”
Instead of tearing down the past, Robility decided to build a bridge to it.
Introducing Robility Terminal—a feature designed to connect your modern automation workflows with your legacy mainframe systems. It’s not about replacing the old; it’s about empowering it.
With Robility Terminal, bots can speak the language of the mainframe—logging in, navigating screens, extracting data, even entering commands—all with precision and speed. It’s like teaching your legacy systems to work alongside a new digital workforce.
If you’ve ever seen a terminal emulator, you’ll know the look: black screen, green monospaced font, blinking cursors. No buttons, no dropdowns, no drag-and-drop. Just raw, grid-based interfaces where every keystroke counts.
For years, navigating these systems has meant manual, repetitive work—typing in codes, moving through menus, copying information field by field. But now, with Robility’s Terminal activities, bots can handle it all.
They work using the classic 24×80 screen grid—recognizing content by row and column, much like a seasoned mainframe operator would. The difference? Bots never get tired. They don’t make typos. And they work 24/7.
Let’s paint a picture.
In a bustling finance department, a daily task once involved a team member logging into a legacy system, searching for payment records, cross-referencing invoice numbers, and updating spreadsheets manually.
Now? A Robility bot connects to the terminal, navigates the exact same screens, retrieves the needed data, and pushes it into the accounting system—all in seconds.
In a customer service center, agents used to toggle between modern CRMs and green-screen interfaces to fetch customer history. Now, a bot fetches the information before the call even connects, so the agent can greet the customer with full context in hand.
In a hospital records department, bots retrieve appointment histories and billing data from an AS400 system, making sure doctors have the right information exactly when they need it.
The magic of Robility Terminal lies in its respect for the past and readiness for the future. With it, organizations can:
✔ Automate without replacing — Keep the systems that work. Automate the processes that slow you down.
✔ Reduce errors — Let bots handle inputs with accuracy, every single time.
✔ Free up time — Focus your people on higher-value work, not screen-hopping and data entry.
✔ Integrate seamlessly — Bring mainframes into your broader automation ecosystem without disrupting operations.
Like any bridge, Robility Terminal works best with the right foundation:
> It currently supports AS400 mainframes
> A terminal emulator must be installed and pre-configured
> Bots interact using the 24×80 screen layout, by targeting specific rows and columns
Once that’s in place, your legacy system is no longer isolated. It’s part of the digital conversation.
Modernizing doesn’t always mean replacing. Sometimes, it’s about connecting the dots—between what’s proven and what’s possible.
With Robility Terminal, you don’t have to abandon the systems that have served you well. You just have to give them a new voice—and a new role in the intelligent automation journey.
It’s time to power the past with the future—and Robility is here to lead the way.
Want to know more about the Terminal?
