AbitMORE SCM Commander - Solutions

AbitMORE SCM Commander’s solution center is a set of ISPF dialogs (ASC solutions) to perform various CMN/ZMF tasks, and this via all sorts of XML services that are executed from within those dialogs. These XML services are hidden within the ASC solutions (and/or the batchjob that may get submitted to complete a request), so that the users of these solutions do not have to know anything about using XML services.

The need for these ASC solutions seem to exist at many CMN/ZMF customers. Each of them have been developed starting from real world needs, e.g. within the context of a CMN/ZMF helpdesk project where many of these solutions have proven to be very helpful.

These ASC solutions exist in 3 flavors of execution modes:

• Online solutions executed from within AbitMORE SCM Commander (ASC).
• Batch solutions started (submitted) from within ASC after which the batch process completes the requested function.
• CMN/ZMF command extensions that can be executed either as an online solution within ASC or as a primary command from within the CMN/ZMF ISPF dialog.

The target audience of each solution is typically one of these:

• CMN/ZMF administrators, e.g. to perform (repetitive) mass administration operations. Typical samples are the solutions to:
  • Rename an outdated security entity in a set of (or all) CMN/ZMF applications.
  • Allocate, verify or delete an application’s promotion-, production- and baseline DSNs.
• CMN/ZMF helpdesk operators, e.g. to keep an operational CMN/ZMF environment “in good shape”. Typical samples are the solutions to:
  • Change the creator ID of a change package (because the package was created by somebody who left the company).
  • Extend the planned install date of all packages in limbo.
  • List a user’s access rights for a specific application.
  • Recreate the X-node DSNs for all frozen packages, optionally only for those who contain package components of a certain library type. The reason why X-node DSNs have to be recreated is often because some production DSN has been renamed, and the corresponding application administration has been updated also in all impacted applications. Therefore the X-node DSNs have to be refreshed to reflect these application administration updates (to avoid JCL errors during package installation for packages that otherwise would still attempt to install in the prior production DSNs).
• CMN/ZMF users (like developers). Typical samples are any of the solutions that are implemented as a CMN/ZMF command line extensions, like:
  • List/View source and related loads.
  • Scan for a string in a package.

Using ASC‘s administration option, each of these solutions can be:

• Assigned a “Category” to indicate the typical target audience of it, which is typically one of these:
  • DEVCMD = online commands (ZMF developers).
  • DEVJOB = batch jobs (ZMF developers).
  • CHDCMD = online commands (ZMF helpdesk).
  • CHDJOB = batch jobs (ZMF helpdesk).
  • ADMJOB = batch jobs (ZMF administrators).
  • ALLCMD = online commands (any ZMF user).
• Secured by specific security entity checks, so that only users that pass the entity check are authorized to execute the solution.
• Enabled/disabled, so that only a subset of solutions is visible in the solution center.

Enjoy reviewing the (always growing) list of built-in solutions that are shipped with AbitMORE SCM Commander.