Experimental project to try out modern development techniques with CICS

The journey so far...

Attempting to create a dev container suitable for the IBM Z Open Editor

Create a global Zowe CLI team configuration, either using the Zowe Explorer or with the following zowe command.

zowe config init --global-config

Edit the config file as required, either using the Zowe Explorer, or with the zowe CLI. For example, to accept self-signed certificates.

zowe config set "profiles.base.properties.rejectUnauthorized" "false" --global-config

Attempting to create a very basic CICS program using the @CICSProgram annotation!

Created a new gradle project using gradle init --type basic (no way to bootstrap a CICS project?)

See:

• https://github.com/IBM/cics-bundle-gradle/tree/main/samples/gradle-war-sample
• https://github.com/cicsdev/cics-java-liberty-link

Some CICS stuff... here be dragons...

TODO: script somehow- using DFHCSDUP? E.g. CSDUPDAT.jclsamp

Need a JVM server

CEDA COPY GROUP(DFH£WLP) JVMSERVER(DFHWLP) TO(WLPGROUP) AS(WLPFTW)
CEDA INSTALL GROUP(WLPGROUP)
CEMT INQUIRE JVMSERVER(WLPFTW)

TODO need JVM profile, and <work_dir>/WLPFTW/wlp/usr/servers/defaultServer/server.xml needs to include the cicsts:link-1.0 feature, e.g.

	<featureManager>
        <feature>cicsts:core-1.0</feature>
        <feature>cicsts:defaultApp-1.0</feature>
        <feature>transportSecurity-1.0</feature>
        <feature>cicsts:link-1.0</feature>
    </featureManager>

Create a bundle

CEDA DEFINE BUNDLE

Bundle       ==> HELLOB
Group        ==> BGROUP
...
BUndledir    ==> <bundle_deploy_root>/<bundle_id>_<bundle_version>

where,

• <bundle_deploy_root> was specified by -Dcom.ibm.cics.jvmserver.cmci.bundles.dir in EYUSMSSJ.jvmprofile, and
• <bundle_id> is the gradle rootProject.name

e.g. /u/cicsdev/cmciBundles/hello-cics_1.0.0

CEDA INSTALL GROUP(BGROUP)
CEMT INQUIRE BUNDLE(HELLOB)

Installing the bundle should cause a program matching the @CICSProgram annotation to get created automatically due to the cicsts:link-1.0 feature, which you can check with

CEMT INQUIRE PROGRAM(HELLODFH)

TODO: would it be better just to include a program in the bundle to avoid having to add the cicsts:link-1.0 feature?

The bundle also includes an LO1 transaction which uses the program, which you can check with

CEMT INQUIRE TRANSACTION(LO1)

TODO use the same group for the bundle and transaction definitions, e.g. HELLOGRP?

Run the transaction!!!

LO1

Note: a CICS bundle is not the same thing as an OSGi bundle!

Gradle build, ftp CICS bundle to USS, and unzip to a suitable bundle directory using jar -xvf <bundle>.zip

For example, using zowe

./gradlew build
zowe ssh issue cmd "rm -Rf ~/cicsBundle && mkdir -p ~/cicsBundle"
zowe zftp upload ftu ./build/distributions/hello-cics-1.0.0.zip "<bundle_dir>/hello-cics-1.0.0.zip" --binary
zowe ssh issue cmd "cd ~/cicsBundle && jar -xvf hello-cics-1.0.0.zip && rm hello-cics-1.0.0.zip"

Alternatively, use ./gradlew deployCICSBundle

This requires CMCI to be working and the 'managedcicsbundles' endpoint to be enabled with the -Dcom.ibm.cics.jvmserver.cmci.bundles.dir parameter. See Configuring the CMCI JVM server for the CICS bundle deployment API

Scripting with Zowe seems quite nice since credentials are stored securely, and the bundle deployement API still requires the bundle to have been defined up front anyway. The bundle deployment API does "just work" when it works though.

Generate the resource definitions schema

zrb generate -m src/main/resources/sample.cicsresourcemodel.yaml -o src/main/resources/sample.cicsresourcedefinitions.schema.json

Build the DFHCSDUP commands file

zrb build --model src/main/resources/sample.cicsresourcemodel.yaml --resources src/main/resources/sample.cicsresourcedefinitions.yaml --output src/main/resources/DFHCSD.txt

TODO:

• there's probably a better place to generate the schema and DFHCSD.txt files
• use yq to fix the bundledir

The resulting commands file can be used when invoking DFHCSDUP as a batch program. See: https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/cics-ts/6.1?topic=dfhcsdup-sample-job-invoking-as-batch-program

First upload the DFHCSDUP commands file to a suitable data set. For example, to create a new partitioned data set and upload the DFHCSD.txt file using Zowe...

zowe zos-files create data-set-partitioned NEW.DFHCSD.DATASET
zowe zos-files upload file-to-data-set "DFHCSD.txt" "NEW.DFHCSD.DATASET(SAMPLE)"

Then refer to your data set in the DFHCSDUP JCL, e.g.

//CSDUP   JOB  ...
//CSDUP   EXEC PGM=DFHCSDUP,REGION=0M,
//             PARM='CSD(READWRITE),PAGESIZE(60),NOCOMPAT'
//STEPLIB  DD DISP=SHR,DSN=xxx.SDFHLOAD
//DFHCSD   DD DISP=SHR,DSN=xxx.DFHCSD
//SYSPRINT DD SYSOUT=*
//SYSIN    DD DISP=SHR,DSN=NEW.DFHCSD.DATASET(SAMPLE)

The REST Client for VS Code works quite well (see the cmci.http file for example), or just use cURL...

curl --request POST \
  --url http://cmci.example.org:1490/CICSSystemManagement/CICSDefinitionBundle/<cics_region> \
  --header 'authorization: Basic <encoded_username_password>' \
  --header 'content-type: application/xml' \
  --data '<request><create><parameter name="CSD"/><attributes name="HELLO" bundledir="/u/ibmuser/cmciBundles/hello-cics_1.0.0" csdgroup="SAMPLE"/></create></request>'