XMA - XFRAME Mainframe Adapter

CIOs and Mainframe managers are very concerned about Mainframe cost increases as part of their effort at satisfying business requirements. The HTWC XFRAME MAINFRAME ADAPTER is a proven Mainframe Emulation suite, which integrates seamlessly with IBM Mainframes, thus offering a cost effective Mainframe upgrade path, whilst lowering barriers to further integration of modern front end environments. The legacy artifacts perceive the emulation environment as a remote CICS region virtually connected via APPC/LU6.2

XMA has been successfully deployed as a parallel Mainframe environment, increasing the capacity of the Mainframe, thus achieving a cost effective Mainframe upgrade, as well as offering a MIPs reduction pathway

XMA is available for TCP/IP, SNA, to deliver high-performance, bi-directional interoperability between applications running on legacy CICS and IMS, with XFRAME XCICS and XIMS respectively.

The applications communicate with both the Mainframe database (e.g. DB2) and the target database (e.g. windows SQL) , wherby transaction completion is guaranteed through the use of 2Phase Commit and Rollback.

In a project with Banco Popolare, we have implemented the SNA protocol stack to manage the operations via the Windows Host Integration Server enabling the communication between 11 IBM CICS, and the corresponding XCICS regions. The various XCICS regions are perceived as authentic partner CICS regions internally, thus increasing Mainframe , capacity, without increasing MIPS and indeed offering a readymade environment for downsizing the MIPS' consumption. Again, all elements are interconnected via SNA APPC LU6

CICS uses a set of Inter System Communications (ISC) protocols for distributed transaction execution across multiple CICS regions. XFRAME supports CICS ISC using the XMA adapter and supplies the same basic features;

Dynamic transaction routing, Allowing terminals connected to one CICS regions, to run transactions in remote CICS' regions. It is data-driven or based on load management policies.

Function Shipping: Function shipping enables a transaction executing on a local CICS system to access remote resources (files, temporary storage queues and transient data queues) in other CICS regions. Also transactions in remote CICS regions can be initiated from local CICS regions

Asynchronous processing when a transaction in one CICS region, invokes a transaction in another CICS region, and both are processed independently of each other.

Distributed program linking (DPL) enables a program running on CICS Option to link to a program running on a remote system. This provides an easy way to access DL/I (IMS) and SQL databases and BDAM files on a remote CICS system

Distributed Transaction Processing (DTP which supports transparent, bi-directional application integration and global transaction coordination between mainframe CICS and IMS/TM applications and re-hosted applications on XFRAME.

XMA - XFRAME Mainframe Adapter

In the sum, the capacity increased while the MIPS consumption remains static.
Environment offers pathaway for MIPS reduction, hence major saving's potential.

XMA provides bi-directional connections with full buffer mapping and propagate transaction context, including user id for security.

Support for CICS DPL (CICS EXEC Link) and DTP (CICS EXEC verbs for LU6.2/APPC commands) facilities makes XCICS domains appear as another CICS region. This integration is provided over TCP/IP stack, allowing TCP/IP network connections to the mainframe while locally using SNA LU6.2 to connect directly from XFRAME's XCIC's to the Mainframe CICS or IMS TM monitors. Additionally, support for SNA connections allows clients to use XMA without installing any new components on the mainframe.

Currently XCICS and XIMS support the SNAP-IX(tm) products family:

  • Microsoft Host Integration Server for Windows
  • Data Connection SNAP-IX for Solaris
  • IBM Communication Server for AIX
  • IBM Communication Server for Linux
  • HP SNA Plus 2 for HP-UX
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FREDDO