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IBM mainframe servers and z/OS can help you along the path to creating your on demand
operating environment.
Together they deliver industry-leading capabilities designed to
help reduce IT complexity and increase business flexibility while driving down costs.
Your IBM mainframe is ready to help leverage, extend and integrate your core business
applications. With middleware and tools to complete the system, you can begin to make
on demand a reality by using the most important asset you have, your z/OS mainframe.
From automation to advanced virtualization technologies and open and industry standards,
z/OS helps deliver competitive advantages for an On Demand Business.
z/OS and z/OS.e V1.7, planned to be available September 30, 2005, is focused on simplifying
z/OS management and enhancing z/OS robust qualities of service.
Simplifying z/OS management
To help simplify systems management, the IBM Health Checker for z/OS is now a base
component of z/OS, providing an integrated tool for checking on best practices for
configuration values.
Significantly more checking is provided and the tool has a simplified user interface.
IBM intends to provide a new user interface for z/OS management that is planned to help
the new generation of Information Technology workers by automating, eliminating, and
simplifying many z/OS management tasks.
The first phase of the new user interface is planned to provide real-time health check
information executed by the IBM Health Checker for z/OS and configuration status
information for z/OS systems and sysplex resources.
The new interface contains built-in automation and expert advice capabilities that
provide detailed contextual information on alerts and corrective actions.
This new interface is planned to be provided in a separate product delivered in 4Q2005.
Simplifying network security
As security concerns continue to increase, more enterprises are deploying network
security protocols, such as IP Security (IPSec) and Transport Layer Security (TLS)
on z/OS to protect their mission-critical data as it crosses the network. However,
the programming changes needed to enable applications for security, and the complexity
of security configuration can increase the cost and deployment time for network security.
In z/OS V1R7, we add the following new functions to z/OS Communications Server to address
these issues by simplifying the requirements for implementing network security on z/OS:
To help you implement these new functions, z/OS V1R7 includes a new configuration tool,
the Network Security Configuration Assistant (NSCA).
This tool combines the configuration activities for AT-TLS and IPSec into a single
administrative task.
See August 2005 Hot Topics for more information.
Other enhancements
To help customers build and extend their z/OS applications, z/OS V1.7 delivers C/C++
enhancements and enhanced support for TLS (Transport Layer Security) designed to be
transparent to applications.
The dynamic capabilities of z/OS are also extended with the TCP/IP Sysplex Load
Balancing Advisor for better interaction with network-based load balancers and
integration between Sysplex Distributor and Workload Manager.
z/OS V1.7 provides advances in business resiliency and security with extensions to
GDPS for system recovery and improvements in RACF interoperability, including support
for mixed-case passwords.
Customers also may see a reduction in their need for IPLs with dynamic service
activation for z/OS UNIX System Services.
In addition, z/OS V1.7 can simplify network management with JES2 NJE support for
TCP/IP (planned to be available in 1Q2006).
z/OS support for the IBM System z9-109
The new System z9-109, designed to provide systems leadership in an integrated
heterogeneous infrastructure, is supported by z/OS V1.4 and above.
The powerful combination of z/OS V1.7 and z9-109 can provide significantly
increased I/O addressability and bandwidth, designed to help improve availability,
performance, cryptography, and problem diagnosis while providing more options for
network connectivity.
These new functions include:
- Multiple subchannel sets support: Provides a second set of subchannels for
defining Parallel Access Volume (PAV) aliases.
This new function can help provide relief from the 64K device limit by allowing
PAV aliases to be defined without making device numbers unavailable for defining
additional devices.
- Support for additional subchannels on the z9-109: The z9-109 makes an additional
768 subchannels available, making it possible to define up to 65,280 devices for
each z/OS LPAR.
- Wild branch diagnosis improvement
- MIDAW (modified indirect addressing words) support: The z9-109 implements a new
function for channel programming, modified indirect addressing words (MIDAWs).
MIDAWs can be used to move data over FICON and ESCON (R) channels.
For FICON channels, this support can provide substantially better response time
while increasing overall channel bandwidth.
MIDAWs exploitation by z/OS is expected to improve performance for some DB2 table
scan, DB2 sequential prefetch, BSAM, and extended-format data set operations by
reducing system overhead for I/O requests, with no application changes
z/OS.e for the z890 and z800 server
z/OS.e V1.7, also planned to be available September 30th, 2005, is a specially priced
offering of z/OS for new applications on the z890 and z800 servers. z/OS.e provides
an operating environment comparable to z/OS in all aspects of services, management
and reporting. z/OS.e supports the zAAP and can participate in a Parallel Sysplex.
Requires IBM System z9 or zSeries Servers
z/OS V1.7 requires the z/Architecture, and runs only on the IBM System z9-109 and
zSeries (z890, z990, z800, z900) servers.
z/OS V1.7 is an important release for all z/OS V1.4 customers, because it is the
last z/OS release that they can migrate to in a single step.
End of service for z/OS V1.4 is planned for March 2007, and customer plans to migrate
to z/OS V1.7 should be in place to ensure migration is complete by this date.
Contact z/OS
Send us your questions and comments.
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