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Status Delivered
Workspace CICS Transaction Server for z/OS
Categories Explorer
Created by Guest
Created on Jan 29, 2015

RELATED IDEAS

CICS Explorer Allow Multiple External Connection Link Customization via the .ini file

Currently you can only customize CICS Explorer via the plugin_customization.ini file with One connection file link. We would like the ability to add multiple connection links to the plugin_customization.ini file, so that we could have a link to a Production Connection file and a link to a separate Test Connection file

This would allow us to update a Production zFS connection file independently from a Test zFS connection file.

Idea priority High
  • Guest
    Reply
    |     Oct 5, 2015

    Due to processing by IBM, this request was reassigned to have the following updated attributes:
    Brand - Servers and Systems Software
    Product family - Transaction Processing
    Product - CICS Transaction Server

    For recording keeping, the previous attributes were:
    Brand - WebSphere
    Product family - Transaction Processing
    Product - CICS Transaction Server

  • Guest
    Reply
    |     Apr 9, 2015

    Hi Lisa, any news on testing this ?

  • Guest
    Reply
    |     Mar 5, 2015

    Thanks for the information. We will Test and Let you know.

  • Guest
    Reply
    |     Mar 1, 2015

    So it turns out you should already be able to do this. Here's an example of defining one connection source from the deployment redpaper (http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/redpapers/pdfs/redp5054.pdf):

    com.ibm.cics.core.connections/connections/CONNECTION_SOURCES/pluginCust-201309061131/LOCATION=http\://myserver/connections.pref
    com.ibm.cics.core.ui/CICSRGN.columnNames=regionName,jobName,MVSSystemID,taskCount

    The first line defines a new connection source, the second line defines some default columns for the CICSRGN table.
    Let's consider the first line only:

    com.ibm.cics.core.connections/connections/CONNECTION_SOURCES <- subnodes of this address define new connections sources
    pluginCust-201309061131 <- the ID of a particular connections source. This is user-controllable, but needs to be unique!
    LOCATION <- a property telling Explorer where to look for the connections. Can be a local file system path, or an http path to a remote resource

    So if you wanted to define 2 independent custom connection sources, you can simply include one line for each location, with different IDs:

    com.ibm.cics.core.connections/connections/CONNECTION_SOURCES/source1-201309061131/LOCATION=http\://myserver/connections1.pref
    com.ibm.cics.core.connections/connections/CONNECTION_SOURCES/source2-201309061131/LOCATION=http\://myserver/connections2.pref

    Note that you can use whatever you like for the ID as long as it's unique, but it's probably best to use java conventions and use something like a company-specific package name:

    com.ibm.cics.core.connections/connections/CONNECTION_SOURCES/com.mydomain.cicsexplorer.connections.1/LOCATION=http\://myserver/connections1.pref
    com.ibm.cics.core.connections/connections/CONNECTION_SOURCES/com.mydomain.cicsexplorer.connections.2/LOCATION=http\://myserver/connections2.pref

    Where mydomain.com is a domain you own, that no-one else should be using.

    Additionally, CICS Explorer uses the IDs to detect updates to the connections within the connection providers. If you change the IDs that you're using for your connection sources, that'll get modelled as some connections being removed, and a different set being added, rather than the connections contained within the source being updated. This means it's probably a bad idea to use a timestamp for your connection source ID, the way the deployment redpaper suggests!

    Let me know how you get on. If this works for you, we should be able to close this RFE.

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