Entire System Server 3.3.1 Release Notes

These Release Notes provide an overview about all changes for Entire System Server 3.3.1.

For background information, further Release Notes of earlier Entire System Server versions are available on the current Natural Documentation CD-ROM in the folder Archive.

This document covers the following topics:


Support of Previous Versions

Note that with the release of Entire System Server 3.3.1, versions of Entire System Server lower than 3.2.1 can no longer be supported. You are therefore strongly advised to migrate to the current version at your earliest convenience.

Prerequisites

Before you can install the Entire System Server, the following Software AG products must already be installed at your site:

  • Natural Version 4.1.3 or above;

  • Adabas Version 7.1.3 with zaps AI713016 and AD713023, or above;

  • Entire System Server Interface (provided with Natural);

  • Entire Net-Work Version 5.8.1 (optional, for multi-CPU Support);

  • Natural ISPF Version 2.5.3 or above (optional)

  • Predict Version 4.3.2 or above (optional).

The Entire System Server Services are available in any Natural environment that runs any or a combination of the following operating systems:

  • z/OS Version 1.4 or above,

  • VSE/ESA Version 2.6 or above; or z/VSE 3.1 or above,

  • BS2000/OSD Version 4 or above.

For z/OS, the relevant PTFs for APARs OW56714, OW56783, OW56980, OW57015, OA03327, OA06209, OA07934, OA10472 and OA12853 must be applied.

(The PTFs related to APAR OA07934 are UA13071 for HDZ11H0 and UA13111 for HDZ11J0 and can be obtained from IBM.)

For z/OS JES2, the PTFs for APARs OW55671, OW55856, OW57577, OA01880, OA02753, OA03125, OA03546, OA05247, OA06230 and OA06694 must be applied.

For z/OS JES3, the PTFs for APARs OW56608, OA01553, OA01715, OA02735, OA03934, OA04380, OA04501, OA06480, OA06535, OA06622, OA07372 and OA13218 must be applied.

See also Information APAR II11784 for recommended JES3 SAPI maintenance.

Since Entire System Server on BS2000/OSD is using operating system interfaces introduced with BS2000/OSD Version 2, it cannot run on earlier operating system versions.

Software AG provides Entire System Server support for the operating system versions supported by their respective manufacturers. Generally, when an operating system provider stops supporting a version of an operating system, Software AG will stop supporting that operating system version.

Although it may be technically possible to run a new version of Entire System Server on an old operating system, Software AG cannot continue to support operating system versions that are no longer supported by the system's provider.

New Features

This section describes new Entire System Server Features. It covers the following topics:

Common New Features

Enhancements to SEND-EMAIL

The SEND-EMAIL support provided with Entire System Server Version 3.2.1 supported the character set defined in ISO 646-US (ASCII). To enable the usage of international character sets with a broader scope of special characters, the new version allows you to specify a HOST-CODE-PAGE as a startup parameter and/or as a field on the SEND-EMAIL request. The EBCDIC characters of the e-mail text will be translated to the ISO 8859-15 character set.

If you want to specify a default reply e-mail address that is different from the sender address, you may now use the new REPLY-TO field of the SEND-EMAIL view.

For the details of these enhancements please see the section Startup Parameters in the Administration Guide and the section SEND-EMAIL, in the User's Guide (see View Descriptions>).

New Features for z/OS

New field in view CATALOG

A new field (FILE-SYSTEM) has been introduced to the CATALOG view to provide the capability to identify a zFS aggregate. Alternatively you may now check the DSORG field of the FILE-ATTRIBUTES view to determine the zFS attribute.

New fields in SPOOL-QUEUE

Three new fields (MAX-RETURN-CODE, SUBMITTER and WLM-QUEUE-POSITION) have been introduced to view SPOOL-FILES to provide more information about jobs in JES2 or JES3.

New Features for BS2000/OSD

Changed CONSOLE Task Setup

In order to control the CONSOLE Task, this task is no longer running as service for all Entire System Server nodes on one host. With version 3.3.1, it is an integrated component of Entire System Server. Therefore, it is not necessary anymore to stop the CONSOLE task with BCAM command BCLOSE.

This architectural change requires individual settings for every CONSOLE Task running on one host. Especially application name used in the SET-DCAM-APPL-LINK statement and user ID and password parameters provided via SYSDTA must be unique for every console task.

New Startup Parameter MONITOR-CANCEL

Startup parameter MONITOR-CANCEL provides additional control for Natural subtasks. If Entire System Server is shutting down, it will cancel active Natural subtasks after elapsed SHUTDOWN-MAX-DELAY if MONITOR-CANCEL=YES is supplied.

For details please see section Startup Parameters in the Administration Guide.

New Startup Parameter NUMCONSMSG

Startup parameter NUMCONSMSG defines the size of the table collecting console messages in number of messages. It was formerly provided as SYSDTA value in the CONSOLE task, but with version 3.3.1 of Entire System Server 3.3.1 it is a regular startup parameter.

For details please see section Startup Parameters in the Administration Guide.

New, changed and deleted fields

The following table summarizes the fields that have been added, changed or deleted. Please see the associated view descriptions in the "User's Guide" for details regarding the affected fields.

View Field Change
CATALOG FILE-SYSTEM New, A3
CONSOLE TEXT A180 --> A253
  NETTO-TEXT A180 --> A253
CONSOLE-LOG RECORD-NUMBER N7 --> N9
FILE-ATTRIBUTES EXTENTS-ARRAY Now also valid for z/OS
  SERIES-ARRAY Now also valid for z/OS
  VOLSER-ARRAY Now also valid for z/OS
LOAD-MODULE BLOCK-TTR Deleted
SEND-EMAIL HOST-CODE-PAGE New, A8
  REPLY-TO New, A128
SPOOL-QUEUE MAX-RETURN-CODE New, A10
  SUBMITTER New, A8 (for z/OS JES3 only)

 

WLM-QUEUE-POSITION New, N7
  WLM-SERVICE-CLASS
New, A8
LIB-DIRECTORY
BLOCK-COUNT N5 --> N7

Migration Checklists

z/OS

Startup Parameters

  • If you are using the SEND-EMAIL view and you want to use a specific host codepage, specify the HOST-CODE-PAGE parameter.

    (See Run E-Mail Client for details.)

VSE/ESA

Startup Parameters

  • If you are using the SEND-EMAIL view and you want to use a specific host code page, specify the HOST-CODE-PAGE parameter.

    (See Run E-Mail Client for details.)

BS2000/OSD

Startup Parameters

  • If you are using the SEND-EMAIL view and you want to use a specific host codepage, specify the HOST-CODE-PAGE parameter.

    (See Run E-Mail Client for details.)

  • If you are using CONSOLE, please adjust the job control of the CONSOLE Task.

    The second SYSDTA entry defining the dimension of the console memory pool must be removed. Please define startup parameter NUMCONSMSG instead.

    The application name used in SET-DCAM-APPL-LINK and user ID and password parameters provided via SYSDTA must be unique for every console task.

    Please use the provided job control sample to avoid missing file assignments.

  • If you are running EOM or EOR, you may specify startup parameter MONITOR-CANCEL=YES to make sure all Natural subtasks are stopped during shutdown of Entire System Server.

Changes with the Next Version

We plan to remove the support to run Entire System Server in single-user mode with the next version. If you still have any single-user environment that cannot be converted to a multi-user environment, please communicate your requirements to Software AG Customer Support.

We plan to remove the support to change the DBID for Entire System Server DDMs using the installation aid (SYSNPR) with the next version.

We plan to implement support for multi-level security in a future version of Entire System Server. This may require changes to customized versions of the current security exits. If you are using non-standard resource classes in your security exits, please communicate your requirements to Software AG Customer Support.