New in OMEGAMON XE for CICS on z/OS V5.3.0

The following functionality was introduced in OMEGAMON® XE for CICS® on z/OS® Version 5.3.0.

Near-term history supported in the OMEGAMON Enhanced 3270 user interface

New in V5.3.0, OMEGAMON XE for CICS on z/OS now supports near term history for the OMEGAMON Enhanced 3270 user interface (enhanced 3270UI) workspaces.

Near term history provides the capability to investigate problems that occurred in the recent past by using the enhanced 3270UI. Near term history provides intuitive access to historical data collected by both agents and IBM® Tivoli® Monitoring. Two types of historical workspace are provided: the historical summary and the historical snapshot.

See the historical data tables appendix in the OMEGAMON XE for CICS on z/OS: Planning and Configuration Guide for more information about PDS sizing. See "Maintaining the persistent data store" in the Reference section of the OMEGAMON XE Shared Documentation, Version 6.3.0 Fix Pack 2.

For more information about using near term history, see OMEGAMON XE Shared Documentation: OMEGAMON XE Enhanced 3270 user interface.

Transaction history in the enhanced 3270UI with CICSplex wide tracking of transactions

Transaction history is now available in the enhanced 3270UI. This feature enables you to see the recent transactions that have been recorded to the Online Data Viewing (ONDV) datastore. It provides the ability to filter transactions by important metrics and view details of transactions, including providing quick navigation to any tasks which form a part of the logical transaction across the CICSplex.

Application Trace in the enhanced 3270UI with CICSplex wide views of distributed transaction

Application trace views are now available in the enhanced 3270UI. This support includes the ability to control which tasks are traced and the ability to see the trace data that has been collected for either an active or historical task. This feature also includes the ability to see trace data from multiple tasks that make up the same logical transaction. Highlighting for long intervals can be especially useful in detecting areas of focus for problems with poor response time.

Transaction file and database details in the enhanced 3270UI

When file and database details are collected for a transaction, the task details and historical views of transactions now provide details of the VSAM files or databases that the transaction has accessed with detailed breakdowns on the number and performance of the various requests that the individual transaction made.

Support for embedded data

In V5.3.0, the embedded data feature was added to the OMEGAMON XE for CICS on z/OS enhanced 3270UI.

The embedded data feature can be used to bring relevant data from other products into the workspace of the hosting product. The embedded data feature imports data from other products in a seamless manner that can enable the user to navigate in context directly to other product workspaces.

For more information about embedded data, see OMEGAMON XE Shared Documentation: OMEGAMON XE Enhanced 3270 user interface.

Installing OMEGAMON for CICS in CICS regions with no JCL changes

OMEGAMON XE for CICS on z/OS V5.3.0 introduces a new feature which is designed to minimize the requirements for JCL changes to CICS regions which you wish to monitor.

In earlier releases, you were required to add load libraries to your CICS regions and DD cards that controlled the monitoring of those regions (RKCPXMnn, RKC2XMnn and KC2GLBcc).

V5.3.0 implements support for a new CICS library definition. The hilev.RKANMODR library, or libraries that you define are used as models to dynamically allocate the required RKANMOD DD statement. The other DD cards are specified using parameters that can either be passed in the CICS INITPARM data or as terminal input.

For many users who run in an environment where the RKCPXMnn, RKC2XMnn and KC2GLBcc cards are allowed to default, the use of the LIBRARY definition means that no JCL changes are required.

For more information, see the "Minimizing the CICS JCL changes" topic in the OMEGAMON XE for CICS on z/OS: Planning and Configuration Guide.

Simplifying startup using the RETRY option

The RETRY options simplifies OMEGAMON startup by removing the requirement to have the OMEGAMON for CICS (3270) started task (IBMOC0) available before OMEGAMON code is initialized in CICS.

The RETRY parameter can be added to the CICS System Initialization Table as an INITPARM parameter. The new parameter specifies how often and optionally how many times OMEGAMON code in the CICS address space attempts to connect to the OMEGAMON for CICS (3270) started task (IBMOC0). This removes the requirement for the OMEGAMON for CICS (3270) started task (IBMOC0) to be initialized before the CICS address space as the OMEGAMON code in CICS can now establish the connection as soon as the OMEGAMON for CICS (3270) started task (IBMOC0) becomes available.

Resource Limiting support for grand dynamic storage area (GDSA) and Container Storage

Resource limiting provides protection to your CICS regions by preventing rogue tasks from consuming too much resource and potentially leading to a system outage. In this release, this protection has been extended to guard against excessive GDSA usage or Container Storage allocation by application tasks.

Bottleneck Analysis feature now exploit IBM System z Integrated Information Processors

Bottleneck Analysis (Dexan) feature of OMEGAMON XE for CICS on z/OS now automatically detect and exploit specialty IBM System z® Integrated Information Processor (zIIP) processors when they are available; this reduces the product’s charged Million Instructions Per Second (MIPS) consumption.

OMEGAMON XE for CICS on z/OS uses zIIP processors to free up computing capacity and reduce overall total computing costs for select data and transaction processing workloads. The zIIP environment accepts eligible work from the z/OS operating system, which manages and coordinates the work between the primary processor and the zIIP processors.

AID and ICE displays in the enhanced 3270UI

The Auto Initiate Descriptors (AID) and Interval Control Elements (ICE) resource types are now displayed for CICS regions.

This information can be useful in determining if applications are running as expected or if system performance is being degraded due to offline facilities in CICS. Authorized users can remove unwanted ICEs or AIDs.

Enhancements to VSAM Record Level Sharing (RLS) reporting in the enhanced 3270UI

In V5.3.0, enhancements have been made to the VSAM RLS Analysis reports so that the owner of a lock is displayed regardless of whether the task is executing within the selected CICSplex. This enhancement results in a more accurate representation of CICS RLS conflicts in the user's environment.