Call the HWICMD service to perform a command against an HMC-managed object that is associated with central processor complexes (CPCs) and CPC images (LPARs). User-defined image groups can also be utilized to target multiple images with a single command.

BCPii commands, because of the very nature of what they are attempting to do, may take a significant amount of time to complete. To prevent applications from being tied up for an excessive amount of time while waiting for the command to complete, HWICMD will return to the caller either when the command has been accepted by the target support element (SE) or when the command was found to contain errors. The actual completion of the command can be determined by consulting the final return code returned in the BCPii command response event.

To receive this BCPii command response event, an application must have registered for the Hwi_Event_CmdResp event prior to the HWICMD invocation. Registration for this or any event is accomplished by calling the HWIEVENT service, or for z/OS UNIX callers, by calling HwiManageEvents. The HWIEVENT service requires a user-supplied Event Notification Facility (ENF) exit.

When the command completes, BCPii will signal the ENF to notify registered applications that a command response has been received. For non-z/OS UNIX callers, the ENF exit specified will receive control and the command response event returned data will contain the final return code of the request. For z/OS UNIX callers, the HwiGetEvent service can be used to receive the event notification and to determine the final return code of the HWICMD service.