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Endevor vs Gen comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Endevor
Ranking in Mainframe Application Development
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
8.0
Number of Reviews
45
Ranking in other categories
Software Configuration Management (1st)
Gen
Ranking in Mainframe Application Development
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Mainframe Application Development category, the mindshare of Endevor is 5.7%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Gen is 5.5%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Mainframe Application Development
 

Featured Reviews

Efrén Yanez - PeerSpot reviewer
Good analysis and integrations with helpful automation
If I had to comment on an area of ​​improvement or something new in the next or future version, I would like to see AI-assisted coding and impact analysis for mainframes. It is actually a fairly complete product. It is robust with a solid history and is always growing in functionality. It has a high level of maturity, which benefits the users and the administrators. This tool, with its group of options, facilitates the integration with other business processes, which allows you to take advantage of other solutions by incorporating automatic functions.
it_user558015 - PeerSpot reviewer
Rapid development software tool. Mature solution to make changes and put them in production.
The dilemma is with people that are stuck in this old technology, and it really is kind of stuck. They don't really understand the new technology, and so it's a gap issue. Those people that would use the tool for more benefit don't really know enough about how to integrate it with the other technologies. The people in the other technologies don't care about your tool. You need that gap filled with CA expertise. CA is supposed to fill that gap and they don’t really do so. They don't really know how to do it, and we don't really know how to take it, to be honest with you. It needs to be figured out. The product is solid, and has been for years and years, and they dabble in new technology. Nobody knows what will be out there tomorrow. Yes, we'd like to address whatever comes out tomorrow and work with that. They need to re-envision themselves not as a seller of new tool sets, but as a tool set enhancer. To enhance the usage of the tool sets they have. They get big maintenance money from this stuff, so it's not like they're not making any money. You don't need to sell new tool sets to make money. They need to enhance it in terms of connecting, or leveraging, with other technologies. As an example, I work on the State of Texas Medicaid system. A huge part of that's written in COOL:Gen/CA Gen. Using those assets in the portal world, in the Windows world, is really important to be able to leverage all the work you did over here and some of the new stuff you do, and we do, but we do it based on what somebody thinks might work, not on somebody sitting down and saying, "Okay, we understand the .NET, WinGen for .NET, and here's how you do .NET, and here's how WinGen does it, and here's how we expect you to use it. Here's how you can make it better, and work harder.”

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"We have used it for years and never had any real issues with it."
"We can make it do pretty much whatever we want, depending on just how complicated we want it to be, as it is pretty flexible."
"The source integrity is the most valuable feature."
"The developers can very easily see what has changed on a particular piece of source code or a program, and others can look at that as well so they can coordinate their changes. It makes it much easier to promote a piece of code up to production."
"The tools are specifically designed for mainframe environments, providing features tailored to the unique requirements of the systems, ensuring there are no mistakes."
"It puts all our source in one product. We know where to go to gather all our source code and which source is associated with which executable. It's a one-stop-shop, one place to go for everything."
"We backup people's source code for them."
"It's very flexible. A new technology comes along, this can be multiplied to handle the new technology quite easily."
"CA Gen has provided us web development capability."
"Full packets, enable you to develop software and systems using these packets, and implement software on the mainframe side and the client side. You can use the same packets, so it's very powerful."
"You can easily manage the code, and you can easily find other changes, other group changes, other models, other components."
 

Cons

"There should be better integration between CA Endevor Software Change Manager and Zowe."
"Interfacing with some change control products that are not CA's, it's a little glitchy on the approvals of changes. It requires special needs for the users for approvals."
"The solution is very expensive."
"Sometimes finding errors and output can be difficult because it spits out so many messages that it is hard to figure out which ones are the ones you need to look at and what flow did it actually take through the processor."
"The customer service and support team are not helpful."
"The initial setup can be less complex and has room for improvement."
"If I had to comment on an area of ​​improvement or something new in the next or future version, I would like to see AI-assisted coding and impact analysis for mainframes."
"Needs more audit capability when it comes to changes to settings that are made by administrators, as many of these are done through the panels and are therefore not logged as an action against a configuration item."
"I cannot use DB2 specifications, DB2 comments, easily."
"The product needs to be well marketed, then adopted. I am not seeing many customers using the product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is expensive."
"The solution is very expensive."
"It's worth the value. The pricing is fairly good, justifiable for the return on investment."
"It's competitively priced and, as far as I know, it's just an enterprise license. We have found it is worth the money."
"Licensing is fairly simple, you don't need multiple licenses."
"Just make sure if you are going to license, ensure you license the right features.​"
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
35%
Computer Software Company
18%
Insurance Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Endevor?
The product’s implementation process is complicated and restrictive. It is difficult to find file programs and use a different tool for the setup as the compilation process is all locked up, at lea...
What is your primary use case for Endevor?
We use the product as a source manager and program manager. It helps in controlling the mainframe code and performing data migrations.
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

CA Endevor Software Change Manager, Endevor Software Change Manager, CA Software Change Manager for Mainframe, CA Endevor SCM
CA Gen
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Blue Hill Data Services Inc.
Global bank
Find out what your peers are saying about Endevor vs. Gen and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.