Mainframe, MVS and zOS Discussion

What is the Architecture required for a .Net front end and mainframe backend?

This is an interview question. More I talked about it more less I'm telling I felt. Also I found that question was too over board.  But if this questionis asked to you, what would you answer?

.Net can run on Linux which means it can run directly on system z these days.  Using it as a front end, though, you could use ODBC or SOAP, depending on what the mainframe has installed.  This question is so broad, however, that it is very difficult to answer.  CICS has web services these days, so if the .Net application is putting together the right formatted data, it could go to CICS on the mainframe even.