The Architect’s Guide to Cool:Gen Insurance Modules: Capturing Complex Claims Branching

Every second a legacy insurance platform runs on Cool:Gen, the risk of a catastrophic "black swan" failure increases. These systems, many of them 30 years old, manage billions in premiums using a model-driven architecture that has become a digital prison. The logic is there, buried in Action Blocks and Procedure Steps, but the experts who built them have long since retired. When it comes to coolgen insurance modules capturing the nuance of complex claims branching, the industry has reached a breaking point.

Traditional rewrite strategies are failing. According to Replay's analysis, 70% of legacy rewrites fail or significantly exceed their timelines, often because the underlying business logic—especially the complex branching of insurance claims—is poorly understood and undocumented. We are currently facing a $3.6 trillion global technical debt crisis, and insurance carriers are at the epicenter.

TL;DR: Legacy insurance systems built on Cool:Gen (CA Gen) are notoriously difficult to modernize due to hidden branching logic. Manual extraction takes 40+ hours per screen. Replay uses Visual Reverse Engineering to reduce this to 4 hours, automating the discovery of coolgen insurance modules capturing complex claims workflows and converting them into documented React components and Design Systems.

The Anatomy of Cool:Gen Claims Complexity#

Cool:Gen (formerly IEF or Composer) was designed to generate COBOL or C code from high-level models. In the insurance sector, this was a boon in the 1990s for handling "Procedure Steps" (PSteps) that dictated how a claim moved from first notice of loss (FNOL) to adjudication. However, these models are now "black boxes."

Video-to-code is the process of recording a live user session within a legacy application and using computer vision and AI to translate those visual interactions into clean, documented React components.

When we discuss coolgen insurance modules capturing branching logic, we are talking about the "if-this-then-that" scenarios that vary by state, policy type, and claimant history. In a typical Cool:Gen environment, this logic is distributed across:

1. •Action Blocks: Reusable logic units that often contain nested conditional statements.
2. •Views: Data structures that pass information between screens, often becoming bloated over decades.
3. •Flows: The transitions between PSteps that are triggered by specific user inputs.

Industry experts recommend that instead of trying to read the generated COBOL, architects should focus on the "behavioral truth" of the application—how it actually performs in the hands of a claims adjuster.

The Cost of Manual Discovery in Insurance#

Manual modernization is a grueling process. To modernize a single claims module, a business analyst and a developer must sit together, navigate every possible permutation of a claim, and manually document the requirements.

As shown, the efficiency of Replay transforms the economics of modernization. By using coolgen insurance modules capturing via video recording, the platform identifies every UI state and the underlying logic triggers without needing to parse antiquated model files.

Capturing Complex Claims Branching with Replay#

The primary challenge in insurance is the "branching" logic. A claim for a fender bender in California follows a different regulatory and procedural path than a total loss in Florida. In Cool:Gen, these paths are often hardcoded into the generated logic.

Replay's Flow feature maps these branches automatically. By recording a user navigating these different scenarios, Replay builds a visual architecture of the application.

Step 1: Recording the Truth#

A claims specialist records their screen while processing various claim types. Replay captures the pixel-level changes, the data entry points, and the navigation triggers. This is the first step in coolgen insurance modules capturing the essence of the legacy system.

Step 2: Component Extraction#

Replay's AI identifies patterns. It recognizes that a specific table structure used for "Coverage Limits" is a reusable component. It extracts this into the Replay Library, creating a standardized Design System from the legacy UI.

Step 3: Logic Mapping#

This is where the complex branching is solved. Replay identifies that when "Policy Type: Commercial" is selected, the next three screens change. It documents this flow, creating a blueprint for the new React application.

Transforming Cool:Gen Logic into Modern React#

Once the coolgen insurance modules capturing phase is complete, Replay generates high-quality, typed code. Unlike generic "low-code" tools, Replay produces clean React components that follow modern best practices.

Below is an example of how a complex Cool:Gen branching logic for claim validation might be translated into a modern TypeScript component after being processed by Replay.

typescript
// Generated by Replay - Claims Validation Component
import React, { useState, useEffect } from 'react';
import { Button, Alert, Card } from '@/components/ui';

interface ClaimBranchProps {
  policyType: 'Personal' | 'Commercial';
  stateCode: string;
  damageEstimate: number;
}

const ClaimsValidationModule: React.FC<ClaimBranchProps> = ({ 
  policyType, 
  stateCode, 
  damageEstimate 
}) => {
  const [requiresAdjuster, setRequiresAdjuster] = useState(false);

  // Replay captured this logic from the Cool:Gen PStep 'VAL-CLM-01'
  useEffect(() => {
    if (policyType === 'Commercial' || damageEstimate > 5000) {
      setRequiresAdjuster(true);
    } else if (stateCode === 'CA' && damageEstimate > 1000) {
      setRequiresAdjuster(true);
    }
  }, [policyType, stateCode, damageEstimate]);

  return (
    <Card className="p-6">
      <h3 className="text-lg font-bold">Claim Routing Status</h3>
      {requiresAdjuster ? (
        <Alert variant="warning">
          This claim requires manual review by a Senior Adjuster based on {stateCode} regulations.
        </Alert>
      ) : (
        <Alert variant="success">
          Claim eligible for automated fast-track processing.
        </Alert>
      )}
      <div className="mt-4">
        <Button onClick={() => console.log('Proceeding to next PStep...')}>
          Continue
        </Button>
      </div>
    </Card>
  );
};

export default ClaimsValidationModule;

This code isn't just a UI shell; it encapsulates the business rules that were previously locked inside the Cool:Gen model. For more on how this impacts long-term maintenance, see our article on Managing Technical Debt in Insurance.

Why Documentation is the Secret Weapon#

67% of legacy systems lack documentation. In the context of coolgen insurance modules capturing, this lack of documentation is a liability. When a system is modernized, the "why" is often lost, leading to regression errors that can cost millions in mispaid claims.

Replay solves this by providing "Blueprints." These are interactive, documented maps of the legacy workflows.

Visual Documentation is a living record of how a legacy system functions, linking recorded video evidence to the generated modern code.

According to Replay's analysis, teams using automated documentation features reduce their QA cycles by 50% because the developers have a clear reference point for the original system's behavior. This is critical when Modernizing Insurance Legacy Systems.

Handling State Management in Complex Branches#

Insurance claims are state-heavy. A claim can be "Open," "Pending Info," "Under Review," "Appealed," or "Closed." Cool:Gen manages this state through complex "View" assignments. When coolgen insurance modules capturing these transitions, Replay maps the state machine.

Here is how a state-driven branching flow looks in modern TypeScript, extracted from a Cool:Gen claims workflow:

typescript
// State machine logic captured from Cool:Gen 'CLM-STAT-MGR'
type ClaimStatus = 'INITIATED' | 'ADJUDICATION' | 'PAYMENT_PENDING' | 'DENIED';

interface ClaimState {
  status: ClaimStatus;
  isHighValue: boolean;
  requiresLegal: boolean;
}

export const getNextStep = (state: ClaimState): string => {
  const { status, isHighValue, requiresLegal } = state;

  // Branching logic captured via Replay Visual Reverse Engineering
  switch (status) {
    case 'INITIATED':
      return isHighValue ? 'ROUTING_TO_EXPERT' : 'AUTO_ADJUDICATE';
    case 'ADJUDICATION':
      return requiresLegal ? 'LEGAL_REVIEW' : 'FINAL_APPROVAL';
    case 'PAYMENT_PENDING':
      return 'DISBURSEMENT_SCREEN';
    default:
      return 'DASHBOARD';
  }
};

By externalizing this logic from the legacy COBOL and representing it in TypeScript, insurance companies gain the agility to update rules in hours rather than months.

Built for Regulated Environments#

The insurance industry is heavily regulated. Any tool used for coolgen insurance modules capturing must meet stringent security standards. Replay is built with this in mind:

• •SOC2 & HIPAA Ready: Ensuring data privacy for sensitive claimant information.
• •On-Premise Availability: For organizations that cannot move their core logic to the public cloud.
• •Audit Trails: Every component generated by Replay can be traced back to the original video recording, providing a 1:1 audit trail of the modernization process.

The Path Forward: From 18 Months to Weeks#

The average enterprise rewrite timeline is 18 months. By the time the project is finished, the business requirements have changed, and the new system is already lagging. Replay's approach of coolgen insurance modules capturing through visual reverse engineering shrinks this timeline by 70%.

Instead of a "Big Bang" rewrite, architects can use Replay to:

1. •Identify high-value modules (e.g., the Claims Branching engine).
2. •Capture the workflows using Replay's recording tools.
3. •Generate a modern React-based micro-frontend.
4. •Integrate the new module back into the legacy ecosystem using a strangler pattern.

This incremental approach reduces risk while delivering immediate value to the business.

Frequently Asked Questions#

How does Replay handle "hidden" logic that doesn't appear on the screen?#

While Replay is a visual reverse engineering platform, it captures the results of hidden logic. If a Cool:Gen action block changes a field's value based on a background calculation, Replay records that state change. For deep backend calculations, Replay provides the architectural "Flow" and "Blueprint" that allows developers to precisely target which COBOL routines need to be exposed via API.

Can Replay handle green-screen (3270) interfaces generated by Cool:Gen?#

Yes. Replay is platform-agnostic. Whether your Cool:Gen modules are rendered as a mainframe green screen, a PowerBuilder UI, or an early web interface, Replay’s computer vision engine can perform coolgen insurance modules capturing by analyzing the visual elements and user interactions.

Does Replay require access to the Cool:Gen source code?#

No. This is the primary advantage of Visual Reverse Engineering. Replay works by observing the application in a runtime environment. This eliminates the need to spend months trying to compile and understand 30-year-old model files or missing source code.

What is the output format for the captured modules?#

Replay generates a comprehensive Design System in React, utilizing Tailwind CSS for styling and TypeScript for type safety. It also provides a documentation suite (Blueprints) and a visual map of all application flows.

Ready to modernize without rewriting? Book a pilot with Replay