DataDirect Shadow z/Services CICS Region
IT infrastructures are distinctive and vary in composition according to the needs of the business they support. It is logical to assume the underlying requirements for mainframe integration would be equally diverse. Organizations wanting to leverage mission critical mainframe assets must have flexible deployment options that better match their unique infrastructure requirements. For those organizations that want to accelerate mainframe SOA and leverage their investments in CICS, DataDirect provides Shadow z/Services for CICS Region.
Product Description
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Shadow z/Services for CICS is a runtime deployment option of DataDirect's Shadow z/Services, the industry leading mainframe Web services technology. The product resides within IBM's CICS and CICS TS platforms and eliminates many of the complexities associated with transforming mainframe business logic and screen based applications into industry standard Web services supporting Service-Oriented Architectures.
Key Features
- Deploys natively on the mainframe inside a CICS region
- Direct access to screen application logic and business application logic - no screen-scraping: CICS, IMS, CA-IDMS, CA-IDEAL, Natural
- Leverages core IBM mainframe technologies: IBM Sockets, CICS Web Support (CWS), CICS Web Services, Enterprise Security Manager (ACF2, RACF, TopSecret)
- Extends and enhances IBM CICS TS 3.1
- Increased HTTP interoperability - support for HTTP 1.1 which enables CICS to act as both an HTTP server as well as a HTTP client when using EXEC CICS commands
- Optimized performance - support for asynchronous sockets which greatly enhances the performances of the runtime under heavy load
- Support for URIMap to allow indirection and flexibility in URL assignments
- Support for UTF8-UTF16 conversion to z/OS code pages
- Support for CHANNEL/CONTAINERS as an alternative to regular COMMAREAs (Screen logic integration programs will benefit from CONTAINERS when large volumes of data are extracted from lengthy pagination processes)
- Capability to link to CHANNEL/CONTAINERS CICS programs
- Supports more flexible CICS Pipelines to provide a "terminal handler" as a replacement for the SOAP for CICS support introduced in previous versions of CICS
Benefits of CICS-based Implementation
By working within the mainframe CICS environment and using any one of these approaches to access legacy code, enterprise organizations enjoy many benefits not available with a screen-based solution including:
- Significant Performance Gains – provides substantial performance increases over screen-based access to legacy applications.
- Removal of Dual-Maintenance Requirement – removes the traditional screen-scraping requirement of modifying the new front-end application or component whenever the legacy application is changed.
- Cleaner Architecture – deploys natively within CICS, eliminates many of the traditional steps involved with screen-based legacy integration. Less steps in deployment means less opportunity for error.
- Advanced Security – integrates seamlessly with the mainframe's Enterprise Security Manager and offers additional algorithms to further enhance mainframe security.
Flexible Options for Mainframe Integration
By offering direct host access to legacy systems, Shadow z/Services for CICS provides enterprise developers with flexible options for development and runtime. Additionally, all of these access alternatives are completely non-invasive to the original application, eliminating all risk associated with intrusive solutions that modify original legacy application code. A direct approach means a more stable architecture, better performance and rapid return on investment.
Options for Direct Access to Mainframe Business Logic and Screens
Shadow z/Services for CICS Region is the only runtime server in the marketplace that deploys natively on the mainframe within a CICS region and offers four high-performance options for direct access to mainframe screen and business logic. These access alternatives provide developers with a tremendous amount of flexibility during development and deployment.
- COMMAREA – Within the COMMAREA, the Distributed Programming Link (DPL) function enables a CICS client program to call a CICS server program in a remote CICS region. Shadow z/Services for CICS allows developers to utilize the DPL to access CICS applications. In fact, the Shadow z/Services for CICS DPL option provides the best performance metrics when building business components or Web services from existing CICS programs.
- Open Transaction Manager Access (OTMA) – OTMA is a transaction-based, connection-less client/server protocol. Though easily generalized, its implementation is specific to IMS in an MVS sysplex environment. It was specifically designed by IBM to allow for high-performance communication with IMS applications. Shadow z/Services for CICS uses OTMA to provide high-performance integration with MFS and non-MFS IMS applications. To leverage the OTMA function, Shadow z/Services for CICS requires IMS 6.1 or greater.
- 3270 Bridge / Linkable Bridge – Another facility of CICS, 3270 Bridge intercepts data flow into and out of a CICS transaction before a 3270 data stream is generated as output or expected as input. With Shadow z/Services for CICS, the 3270 Bridge is a more intrusive method than other options, necessitating an intricate interaction with back-end programs - however, this approach does provide better performance metrics. When it is not possible to utilize the COMMAREA facility and the DPL option, 3270 Bridge is the preferred methodology.
- Front-End Programming Interface (FEPI) – Shadow z/Services for CICS also offers the option of using FEPI, which allows for broader coverage of older CICS, Natural, CA-IDMS and CA-IDEAL, as well as IMS applications. By means of simulated terminals, FEPI provides access to CICS or IMS applications available through a communications network and then enables developers to write CICS application programs that access other CICS or IMS applications. FEPI is the solution of choice for older CICS systems that were not written to allow for DPL access.
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