IMS Connect and TCP/IP communications

The IMS™ Connect function of IMS provides access to both IMS DB and IMS TM from TCP/IP-enabled environments.

The following topics are written to help programmers, operators, and system support personnel install, configure, and administer IMS Connect to support clients that communicate with IMS by using TCP/IP connections

  • Overview of IMS Connect
    IMS Connect provides high performance TCP/IP and local z/OS® communications between one or more IMS Connect clients and one or more IMS systems. IMS Connect supports both IMS DB and IMS TM systems.
  • Overview of IMS Connect exit routines
    IMS provides a variety of exit routines to support IMS Connect.
  • IMS Connect support for IMSplex and shared queues
    IMS Connect can send and receive IMS Operations Manager (OM) commands and response string messages between a TCP/IP client and the OM in an IMSplex by using the IMS Structured Call Interface (SCI).
  • IMS Connect security support
    IMS Connect includes a variety of options for implementing and modifying the security checking performed on messages as they arrive in IMS Connect and, for IMS TM connections, as they arrive at the data store.
  • IMS Connect support for callout requests
    IMS Connect is a required component when IMS application programs issue callout requests through OTMA to data or service providers that are external to the IMS installation. For both types of callout request, IMS Connect serves as the TCP/IP gateway between the IMS Connect client that use TCP/IP and the OTMA component of IMS.
  • IMS Connect XML message conversion
    For some IMS Connect client application programs, IMS Connect can convert XML messages into either COBOL or PL/I, so that you do not need to modify existing IMS application programs to process messages submitted to IMS in XML.
  • IMS Connect message structures
    TCP/IP clients and local clients using the z/OS program call interface communicate with IMS Connect by using an IMS request message (IRM) header on each input message. The IRM header is used on input messages from IMS Connect client application programs to communicate protocol options to IMS Connect. The IRM header is mapped by the IMS Connect HWSIMSCB macro.
  • OTMA header fields used by IMS Connect
    IMS Connect uses fields in the headers of messages sent to OTMA to communicate processing options and other information to IMS.
  • IMS Connect protocols
    IMS Connect provides several different transaction protocols.
  • IMS Connect two-phase commit support
    IMS Connect supports two phase-commit for both IMS TM transactions and IMS DB database requests.
  • Unicode considerations for IMS Connect
    IMS Connect support for Unicode allows Unicode data to be sent to and from an IMS Connect client application. In certain circumstances, IMS Connect translates the Unicode data.
  • TCP/IP settings for IMS Connect
    You can choose different TCP/IP values to maximize your environment settings for IMS Connect.