CICS for Operators course outline

CICS for Operators

Duration: 2 days

Audience: Operators who will be controlling CICS/TS

Prequisites: 6 months operating experience

Objectives: Top Contents

On successful completion of this course each student will be able to:

* describe the components of CICS relevant to the operations department
* explain the meaning of common CICS terminology
* describe how CICS handles logging and journalling
* describe how CICS handles a transaction
* send messages to users
* use CEMT to control resources such as programs, tasks, files, and transactions
* cancel a task
* describe how CICS and DB2 interface with each other
* describe how CICS Recovery/Restart is implemented
* describe the differences between cold, warm and emergency starts
* start up and shut down CICS
* control Dump, Trace, and Journal files
* interpret CICS messages and codes
* perform basic problem analysis and resolution

Contents: Top Objectives

CICS Overview
Introduction to CICS structure and facilities; management modules and tables; CICS security; recovery and restart; methods of controlling CICS/ESA; CICS Web support; 3270 Bridge, CICS Transaction Gateway.

Operating CICS
Master terminal operator function; starting CICS: cold, warm, emergency starts; closing down CICS; CICS datasets; how a user signs on and off; security classes; Master Terminal transactions.

Using CEMT
Facilities; CICS system defaults; PF key functions; CEMT format and parameters; controlling tasks, programs, and datasets; terminals and lines; enabling and disabling transactions; set, perform, discard; controlling dump files, printing dump file contents, etc.

CICS and other regions
Multiple CICS regions, MRO components, transaction affinities; ISC; CICSPlex.

CICS-supplied transactions
CESN, CESF, CEOT, CMSG; Resource Definition Online: CEDA; CECI, CEBR, CEDF, CEDX, CBRC, CDBC, CSFE, CMAC.

Recovery Restart
CICS global catalog, recoverable resources, CICS logging (journalling), journal control, keypoints, Journal and Emergency Restart, automatic journal archiving, VSAM forward recovery, Backup While Open, XRF: Extended Recovery Facility, VTAM Persistent Sessions.

Further transactions and uses
Sending messages; issuing CICS commands from the console; deallocating and allocating datasets; handling active and suspended tasks; managing CICS-attached printers.