Cheryl's List #85 -
February 17, 2004
 |
- Welcome to Cheryl's List! If you obtained this from someone else
and would like your own FREE copy of Cheryl's List in the future, see the
information at the end of this document.
1. Cheryl Watson's TUNING Letter 2003, No. 6
2. Some Typos
3. z/OS 1.5 Announcement
4. SHARE Sessions
1. Cheryl Watson's TUNING Letter 2003, No. 6
The forty-four page 2003, No. 6 TUNING Letter was emailed to electronic subscribers on February 13. The print issues will be mailed this week. You can purchase a printed copy of the current TUNING Letter for $95 at http://www.watsonwalker.com. The following "Management Summary" contains a summary of just some of the contents of this latest TUNING Letter. Elsewhere in the issue, we listed the 2004 subscription prices, which are unchanged from 2003.
CPU Reporting - Part 1
Our Focus article describes methods of reporting CPU (processor)
utilization. The main theme of the article is that the use of average
CPU busy is no longer a valid method of reporting. Many people have
indicated that their management still wants reporting by average CPU busy.
Here is our plea for you to educate your management and get them to reconsider
their position. With the new technologies that exist today, the concept
of average CPU busy simply doesn't make sense. We explain why and
provide some alternative methods starting on page 20. We'll be continuing
this series of articles with Part 2 covering latent demand considerations.
Software Pricing
If you looked at IBM's announcement of On/Off Capacity on Demand (OOCoD)
and found it too expensive, you might want to check again. Although
they haven't reduced the hardware prices, IBM has recently reduced
the software prices (often by as much as 50%) for anyone who wants to use
OOCoD. Please see our article on page 41.
Request for z990 Upgrade Experiences
In our Cheryl's List #83, we asked installations to share their experiences
when upgrading to a z990 processor. We're preparing an article on
z990 performance for our next TUNING Letter. We would appreciate
any experiences, good or bad, that you might have had when upgrading to
a z990. Your comments will be kept confidential if you prefer.
Our list of specific questions can be found on page 42 and in Cheryl's
List #83 (http://www.watsonwalker.com/clist83.html).
Elsewhere in This Issue
There aren't too many management topics other than the CPU reporting
article in this issue, but it's jam-packed with a large number of technical
recommendations. In our News section starting on page 4, we
cover several new APARs (HIPER, IMS and FICON), a problem with WLM managed
initiators, and considerations when porting data between platforms.
We also teach you how to diagnose Parmlib problems at IPL, alert you to
some interesting IBM WSC Flashes and other documents, and introduce some
excellent IBM Redbooks. Our IRD article in the last issue generated
a lot of questions, so we're providing an IRD Update on page 15.
Our User Experiences, starting on page 31, give some reasons why you might experience high CPU time in the Console task, provide a warning about the poor design of a new CPU time field in the SMF type 30 record, and describe an important APAR for z/OS 1.4 running under VM. We also provide an explanation of how SMF might indicate that jobs were being classified into SYSOTHER when they were not, and give an update to our VSAM insert article from the last issue. The Q & A section (starting on page 36) discusses swappable WebSphere regions, provides a detailed discussion of DDF enclaves and gives recommendations for classifying APPC transactions.
2. Some Typos
We've had some typos in the last two issues, but we think that they're too small to send out a new PDF.
TUNING Letter 2003, No. 5
Jerry Urbaniak of Acxiom pointed out that one of the three APARs
referred to in FLASH10248 should be OA04265 not OA04625
(page 12).
TUNING Letter 2003, No. 6
These typos only appear in the electronic version of the TUNING Letter
and are corrected in the print version and on the CD-ROM.
Page 30 - "but these look quite different will real data." should be "...with real data."
Page 34 - "when running z/VM under z/OS" should be "when running z/OS under z/VM."
Page 36 - "whether such a radical step is be undertaken" should be "...is to be undertaken."
3. z/OS 1.5 Announcement
The official announcement for the general availability (GA) of z/OS 1.5 was made on February 10, 2004 in letter #204-017. We'll have a more thorough description of the announcement in our next TUNING Letter, after SHARE. Until then, there are some important items we'd like to note:
a. The GA date for z/OS 1.5 and the console enhancement feature for z/OS 1.4 is March 26, 2004. The GA date for z/OS 1.6 is September 2004. Remember that 1.6 can run ONLY on a zSeries machine.
b. Please remember that z/OS 1.4 is the last bimodal version, so if you're converting from OS/390, you should certainly be considering installing z/OS 1.4.
c. System Managed Coupling Facility Duplexing for z/OS 1.2 to 1.4 is now GA. It had previously been restricted to customers who worked individually with IBM. It can be activated on z/OS 1.4 with APAR OW41617 and a companion APAR OA05328.
d. z/OS 1.4 and z/OS 1.5 can both be ordered until September 9, 2004, although IBM recommends that orders be placed before August 31. The end of service date for both products is March 2007.
4. SHARE Sessions
Clark and I will be at SHARE in Long Beach, California all next week. I will be presenting a new session 2539, "Cheryl Watson's WLM Update/New Product Announcement," Tuesday at 3 p.m. and my regular session 2509, "Cheryl's Hot Flashes #11," Friday at 9:30 a.m. At the WLM session (2539), we'll be announcing a brand-new Watson & Walker software product. It will be described in the next Cheryl's List, and on our Web site (www.watsonwalker.com) after SHARE. Clark will be giving a new session 2928, "Finding Gold with the z/OS UNIX APIs," Wednesday at 8 a.m. Please stop by and say hello!
Brian Peterson and Skip Robinson, SHARE MVS Program Managers
posted the following item on IBM-Main. We really like their suggestions,
so thought that you might find it useful too. Here's their email:
- Greetings to all! It's time to start thinking about the Winter SHARE,
February 22 - 27, 2004 in Long Beach. We have an excellent slate
of sessions, and a bevy of willing speakers. All we need is you!
We hope you'll be able to attend, and please look us up if you do.
Check out http://www.share.org for registration
details.
Introductory Sessions
---------------------
Everyone talks about the greying of SHARE, and it's true that none
of us are getting any younger. As some of the old guard starts to
retire, our future systems programmers can get up to speed by attending
these introductory sessions:
System Programmer Topics
------------------------
In an OCO world, where can you go to learn about how things really
work? Why, SHARE of course! Here is a sample of the down and
dirty sessions we offer:
2625/6 ISPF Hidden Treasures
2664 Exploiting New JES2 Interfaces
2827 Improvements in z/OS Service
2828 Debugging Using IPCS in z/OS: Hints and Tips
2829 z/OS Virtual Storage Mystery Tour
2835 How Do You Do What You Do When You're a CPU?
2852 Coding z/OS Recovery for Assembler Applications
2881 Coming Soon to a Screen Near You - z/OS 1.4 Console Restructure
2937/8 Diagnosing Problems in a UNIX System Services Environment
3014 Learn More About the System Data Mover
Getting to z/OS 1.4
-------------------
If you are considering migrating to z/OS or upgrading from a previous
release, SHARE is the place to get the latest information to help plan
your migration. Highlighted sessions include:
2655 JES2 z/OS 1.5 Product Update
2668 Migrating JES2 from OS/390 2.10 to z/OS 1.4 User Experience
2839 z/Architecture (64-bit) User Experience
2870/1/2 Migrating to z/OS 1.4/1.5 (three part session)
2879 ServerPac: Enhancements for z/OS 1.4/1.5
Goal Mode
-----------------
Are your systems running in WLM Goal Mode? Once you IPL z/OS
1.3 or above, you will be! Come to SHARE and learn how to implement
and refine your Goal Mode policy. Whether you're still running Compatibility
Mode, or have been running Goal Mode for years, at SHARE you will learn
valuable tips and techniques for making your systems run even better.
2541 Intro to Goal Mode for Those in a Panic
2542 Workload Manager Managed Batch Initiators
2543 WLM and Batch / Started Tasks
2544 WLM, DB2, and Enclaves: The Inside Story
2546 WLM: Top Ten Mistakes
2547 WLM and z/OS WebSphere: A Multi-Faceted Relationship
2548 WLM: Peter Enrico's Cookbook Approach to Revisiting WLM
2549 WLM Best Practices: Meet the Panel of Experts
zSeries Processors
-----------------------------------------------
z/Architecture and the new z990 Processor are big news from IBM, and
SHARE has the latest information. To increase your knowledge of z/Architecture
and the latest z990 Processor, consider the following sessions:
2818 Zee Guide to z/Architecture
2824/5 Living in the 64-bit World: z/OS Architecture and Debugging
2838 What's New in z/OS
2846 z800 Introduction and Update
2892 Introducing the z990: Processor, Memory, and System Structure
2893 Introducing the z990: Channel Subsystem, I/O, and HMC
2894 A z/OS Sysprog's Guide to z990 Migration
2895 HCD Update: z990 Support in HCD
Hands-on Lab
------------
In the SHARE "hands-on lab" you will have a unique opportunity to take
the controls and actually perform installation and customization activities
on a live system under the supervision of an instructor. Here's a
sample of the topics offered:
2556 RMF Spreadsheet Reporter Hands-On Lab
2557 RMF PM Hands-On Lab
2722 (E)JES Live Hands-On Lab
2822 IPCS Tools and Techniques Hands-On Lab
2823 Using IPCS to Diagnose Abends Hands-On Lab
2990 WebSphere Application Server V5 Deployment Hands-On Lab
2991 WebSphere Application Server V5 Configuration Hands-On Lab
2997 UNIX System Services Tools and Toys Hands-On Lab
Don't Miss
----------
In addition to the sessions above, consider these "don't miss":
2400 MVS Program Opening and z/OS Keynote Presentation (You can't be
that tired already on Monday morning!)
2509 Cheryl Watson's Hot Flashes
2514 WSC Short Stories and Tall Tales
2680 JES2: Esprit de Corps
2817 Bit Bucket
2861 Fully Wired Hot Topics
2878 z/OS SysProg Goody Bag
Stay tuned!
Cheryl Watson
======================================================
- Thanks for subscribing to Cheryl's List! Feel free to forward this
to others who may be interested.
If you obtained this from someone else and would like your own copy in the future, just go to our Web page at http://www.watsonwalker.com and fill out the form under "Cheryl's List." That signs you up, and it's free! It's a one-way list, from us to you. If you make a "reply," it will come just to me, not to the other members of the list. We never share your address or information with anyone else. To unsubscribe, use the Web page and password mentioned in your welcome message. Past Cheryl's List issues, starting with #1 of December 1996, can always be obtained at http://www.watsonwalker.com/archives.html.
In Cheryl's List, we provide updates to our full newsletter, Cheryl Watson's TUNING Letter. We’ll also let you know if anything of importance has been added to our Web pages, and tell you about our other products and services.
Please note that this email service is not intended to match or summarize the large scope and volume of information we provide in Cheryl Watson’s TUNING Letter. The TUNING Letter is published six times a year and costs $765 for the electronic version: a yearly CD-ROM of back issues and six PDF issues emailed during the year. The print-only version costs $545 in North America and $600 abroad. See http://www.watsonwalker.com/TUNING.html for details. Past tables of contents are at http://www.watsonwalker.com/TofC.html, and a FULL SAMPLE ISSUE can be found at http://www.watsonwalker.com/pdf.
So - we hope you'll find this service valuable. Be sure to send email to technical@watsonwalker.com if you have any questions or comments.