SPARTA News

March 2016

SPARTA President’s Corner

contributed by Randy Springs

As we pass this year’s leap day of Monday, February 29, we move into March Madness. At most companies, budgets have been approved, project priorities have been set for the new year, and we are all busy trying to meet personal and corporate objectives.

Since our meeting this month coincides with SHARE in San Antonio, we have not been able to line up a speaker due to prior commitments, so we are planning to have an extended time of allowing everyone present to discuss current projects and/or issues going on in their current environments. It should be a fun night of knowledge sharing, networking, and discussion of current industry trends and developments. We could probably spend the entire evening discussing the latest Apple privacy debate with the feds. Plan to come at 6:15 for subs and dessert.

I look forward to seeing you at LabCorp on Tuesday, March 1.

Randy Springs
BB&T

Future Speakers

(subject to change)

March 1, 2016 - SPARTA Roundtable by SPARTA Attendees

April 5, 2016 - SHARE Conference Reports by SPARTA Members

We need ideas and volunteers for future speakers. Presentations don’t have to be fancy, just informative and interesting. Even a 5 or 10 minute talk can start an interesting interaction. Contact Ron Pimblett by phone as noted below.

2015-2016 SPARTA

Board of Directors

Randy Springs - President

BB&T (919) 745-5241

3200 Beechleaf Court, Suite 300

Raleigh, NC 27604

Ron Pimblett - Vice President

MDI Data Systems 919-426-6518

866-634-3282

Raleigh, NC 27609

Mike Lockey - Secretary

Guilford Co. Information Services 336-641-6235

201 N. Eugene St.

Greensboro, NC 27401

Tommy Thomas - Treasurer

LabCorp 336-436-4178

3060 S. Church St.

Burlington, NC 27215

Ed Webb - Communications Director

SAS Institute Inc. 919-531-4162

SAS Campus Drive

Cary, NC 27513

Meetings

Meetings are scheduled for the first Tuesday evening of each month (except no meeting in January), with optional dinner at 6:15 p.m. and the meeting beginning at 7:00 p.m.

These monthly meetings usually are held at LabCorp’s Center for Molecular Biology and Pathology (CMBP) near the Research Triangle Park (see last page). Take I-40 to Miami Boulevard and go north. Turn right onto T.W. Alexander Drive. Go about a mile or so. Then turn right into LabCorp complex and turn Left to the CMBP Building (1912 T.W. Alexander Drive). In the lobby, sign in as a visitor to see Tommy Thomas. Tommy will escort you to the conference room.

Call for Articles

If you have any ideas for speakers, presentations, newsletter articles, or are interested in taking part in a presentation, PLEASE contact one of the Board of Directors with your suggestions.

Newsletter e-Mailings

The SPARTA policy is to e-mail a monthly notice to our SPARTA-RTP Group. The newsletter is posted to the website about five (5) days before each meeting so you can prepare. The SPARTA-RTP Group is maintained by Chris Blackshire; if you have corrections or problems receiving your meeting notice, contact Chris at chrisbl@nc.rr.com.

October 2015 “CBT Tape” Shareware Online

The directory and files from the latest CBT tape V490 (dated October 26, 2015) are available from www.cbttape.org.

If you need help obtaining one or more files, contact Ed Webb at SAS (see Board of Director’s list for contact info).

Minutes of the February 2, 2016 Meeting

•Meeting was called to order at 7:05 PM by Randy Springs, the SPARTA President.

•The February meeting was held at a LabCorp conference room in RTP, N.C.

•Fourteen (14) people were present of which Twelve (12) are 2015 members.

•Everyone in the room introduced themselves, told where they worked, and briefly described their job functions or their job hunting challenges.

•The minutes for the November and December meetings were approved as published in the December 2015 and February 2016 newsletters.

•The reading of the Treasurer's report was given by Tommy Thomas. The reading was altered from the published version in the February newsletter. The corrected current balance of $278.58 was approved as read.

OLD BUSINESS

•Tommy reminded everyone to leave the LabCorp conference room clean.

•Future Speakers and Topics (subject to change based on internal politics, budget, the weather):

Date	Company	Speaker	Topic
March 1, 2016	Phoenix Software	Ed Jaffe	EJES for JES2 and JES3
April 5, 2016	Various	SHARE Attendees	SHARE March 2016 Update
May 3, 2016	IBM	Rosalind Ratcliffe	CAMSS-DevOPS
June 7, 2016	Rocket Software	Paul Pendle	DB2 Logs and all
July 12, 2016	SZS	David Wilson	4HRA Peak
August 2, 2016	EMC	Mike Fishman	Architecting Data Protection
August 30, 2016	Baseball night	Tommy’s Spit Ball	Fun at the Park
Oct 4, 2016	Various	SHARE Attendees	Share Atlanta Information
November 1, 2016	TBD
December 6, 2016	TBD

If you have suggestions about speakers and topics, contact Ron Pimblett (919-833-8426).

•The next SPARTA monthly meeting will be on Tuesday, March 1, 2016 at LabCorp in RTP.

•Food for the March 1 meeting will be subs.

NEW BUSINESS

•The 2016 dues are due ($30) starting in March 2016. Please pay Tommy Thomas.

•Thanks to LabCorp and Tommy Thomas for hosting the meeting.

•There are currently 65 people on the SPARTA-RTP email list.

•Send any e-mail address changes to Chris Blackshire so he can update the SPARTA-RTP Listserv. You will be added by the moderator (Chris = SPARTA-RTP-owner@yahoogroups.com) sending you an invitation to Join the list.

• We need to think about getting more corporate sponsors for 2016.

• We need to start thinking about the 2016 officer nomination process.

•The business portion of the meeting ended about 8:00 p.m.

PRESENTATION

What's New in Mainframe Performance Tuning and Enhancements by Randy Springs of BB&T.

• Agenda

- Personal Experiences
- What is Performance Management?
- Performance Management Tools
- Recent IBM Hardware Improvements
- Recent zOS Software Enhancements
- Online Demo

• Personal Experiences (with many great pictures)
- 1974-1979 - UNC Chapel Hill
- 1979-1981 - GTE Data Services
- 1981-1999 - SCM (Glidden / ICI Paints)
- 1999-2007 - IBM
- 2007-Present - BB&T

• IBM Hardware Comparison that Randy has worked on over the last 42 years:

Component	IBM 360/75	IBM z13
Byte Length	8 bits	8 bits
Word Length	32 bits	32 bits
Channel Architecture	Bus & Tag	FICON
Tape Architecture	9 Track	Virtual
Registers	16 32-bit GPRs	80+ 64-bit GPRs
PSW	64 bits	128 bits
Instruction Address	24 bits	64 bits
Maximum Memory	1 Megabyte	10 Terabytes
CPU Speed	8.696 MHz	5 GHz
Cycle Time	750 nanoseconds	0.2 nanoseconds

• MVS OS Release History
- 1964 OS/360 PCP
- 1966 OS/360 MFT
- 1967 OS/360 MVT
- 1972 OS/VS1
- 1972 OS/VS2 R1 (SVS)
- 1974 OS/VS2 R2 (MVS)
- 1978 MVS/SE
- 1979 MVS/SE2
- 1980 MVS/SP V1
- 1981 MVS/SP V2 (XA)
- 1988 MVS/SP V3 (ESA)
- 1990 MVS/SP V4 (ESA/SP)
- 1995 OS/390 V1
- 1996 OS/390 V2
- 2000 z/OS V1
- 2013 Z/OS V2

• What Does Performance Management Include?
- Using appropriate control parameters to achieve desired service objectives
- Monitoring and measuring systems to assess efficiency and effectiveness
- Dealing with incidents of performance that are inefficient or inadequate to meet desired service objectives
- Keeping up with latest hardware architectural improvements to maximize performance improvement opportunities
- Using latest software parameters and best practices to maximize system performance levels and meet desired service level objectives
- Management reporting

• What is important in performance management?
- Batch throughput
- User response times
- Meeting service level objectives
- Identifying bottlenecks
- Challenges of mobile workloads

• Batch throughput
- WLM Classification
- Number of initiators available for your job’s JOBCLASS
- Effective I/O usage (tape/disk, blocksizes, VSAM/RLS)
- Enqueues with other jobs and/or online systems

• User Response Times
- Customer-facing applications
- Online system parameters
- Network delays
- Distributed server delays
- Mobile transactions

• Management Reporting
- Review current management reports
- Consider new ways of presenting the data
- Summarize data daily/weekly/monthly in order to respond to ad hoc requests quickly and without using excessive system resources
- Work with capacity planning to develop meaningful trending

• Performance Management Tools
- RMF
- SDSF
- Omegamon
- zOS Management Facility (zOSMF)

• RMF Product Overview
- RMF Spreadsheet Reporter
- - RMF Postprocessor
- - RMF Sysplex Data Server and APIs
- - RMF Data Gatherer
- RMF Performance Data Portal
- - RMF Distributed Data Server (GPMSERVE)
- - RMF Monitor II and III
- - RMF Sysplex Data Server and APIs
- - RMF Data Gatherer
- zOSMF Resource Monitoring
- - RMF Distributed Data Server (GPMSERVE) & RMF XP (GPM4CIM)
- - CIM Client APIs
- - AIX & Linux CIM Provider

• Recent IBM Hardware Improvements
- Z13 zIIPs -- Simultaneous Multithreading Technology (SMT) allows two active instruction streams per core, each dynamically sharing the core’s execution resources (processor, cache memory)
- zAAP eligible workloads (Java, XML) runs on zIIPs now
- Increased cache memory per core improves performance

• IBM zEC12 versus z13 Improved Cache Architecture
- zEC12 Caches
- - L1 private 64k instructions, 96k data
- - L2 private 1 MB i + 1 MB d
- -L3 shared 48 MB / chip
- - L4 shared 384 MB / book
- Z13 Caches
- - L1 private 96k i, 128k d
- - L2 private 2 MB i + 2 MB d
- - L3 shared 64 MB / chip
- - L4 shared 480 MB / node
- - - Plus 224 MB L3 NIC Director

• Recent zOS Software Enhancements
- HiperDispatch
- CPU Measurement Facility
- Intelligent Resource Director (IRD)
- SMF Parameters

• HiperDispatch
- Should not be optional in today’s environments
- Work is managed across few logical processors
- Processors can be “parked” if CPU is low to reduce PR/SM overhead
- New SMF type 99 subtype 14 contains HiperDispatch Topology data
- New WLM Topology Report available to process the SMF 99.14 records

• CPU Measurement Facility
- Available on all processors since z10
- Provides hardware instrumentation data
- HIS started task writes SMF 113 records
- - Cache and memory hierarchy information
- - Sampling data for Instruction time-in-CSECT
- Gathered on an LPAR basis – should be turned on all LPARs

• Intelligent Resource Director (IRD)
- Shifts processor and I/O capacity among LPARs in a SYSPLEX environment
- May require WLM adjustments – dynamically moves resources to high priority workloads that are not achieving their service level goals
- Major components of IRD
- - LPAR CPU Management
- - Dynamic Channel Path Management (DCM)
- - Channel Subsystem Priority Queuing (CSSPQ)

• SMF Parameters
- New/Modified SMF Parameters in zOS V2.1 and V2.2
- IEACMDxx Parameter ADYSETxx
- - SYSMDUMP(SUPPRESSALL) added to suppress all duplicate dump
- COFVLFxx Parameter ADYSETxx
- - CLASS statement has new keyword ALERTAGE(nnn)
- - - Number of seconds objects can remain in storage
- - New dynamic modify command added to dynamically change VLF programs that are cached
- - - MODIFY VLF,REPLACE,NN=(aa,…,bb)
- GRSCNFxx Parameter MONITOR(YES)
- - Added new GRS monitor to monitor ENQ requests and global generic scans (heavy CPU user)
- - zOS V2.2 added a new GRSMONxx member for PARMLIB to provide filtering of monitoring for reduced overhead
- IEASVCxx
- - New parameter EPNAME(IGCERROR) added
- - Gives Fxx abend for invalid SVC xx
- IEASYSxx
- - Added new keyword to LFAREA parameter
- - INCLUDE1MAFC(NO/YES) will include 1 MB pages in RCEAFC (available frame count) to reduce paging
- - - Default for zOS V2.1 is NO – recommended to change to YES
- - - Default for zOS V2.2 is YES

• Blocked Workload Support
- Running at/near 100%, work competes for resources due to locks/latches
- WLM can recognize this blocked work and allow it to use CPU periodically
- IEAOPTxx parameters:
- - BLWLTRPCT – Percentage of CPU capacity of the LPAR to be used to promote blocked workloads
- - - 1-200 (0.1% to 20%)
- - - Default is 5 (0.5%)
- - BLWLINTHD – Time interval threshold before blocked work can be eligible for promotion
- - - 5-65535 seconds
- - - Default is 20 seconds
- RMF Workload Activity Report shows promoted transactions

• New RMF Options
- New SMF Type 90 Subtype 37 Record
- - zOS V2.2 only
- - Documents dynamic APF changes
- New Console Message
- - zOS V2.2 only
- - IOS128I IPL DEVICE: sdddd VOLUME: vvvvvv
- New REGIONX JCL Parameter
- - zOS V2.2 only
- - REGIONX=(6M,1G) example
- - - Allows separate below-the-line and above-the-line region values
- New SETSSI Delete Parameter
- - zOS V2.2 only
- - SETSSI DELETE command added to remove a subsystem
• Current Hot Performance Improvement Areas
- SMF on LOGSTREAM vs. VSAM MANx datasets
- COBOL V5.2 Enhancements
- Large Page Frames (1 MB or 2 MB) – especially for DB2 buffer pool

• Online Demo
- No Demo as Randy could not access the BB&T network from the LabCorp network.

• Contact info
Randy Springs
IT Mainframe Engineering - Performance & Tuning
Branch Banking & Trust Co.
RSprings@BBandT.com
Phone (919) 745-5241

• The presentation and meeting ended about 8:55 P.M.

Treasurer’s Report for February 2016

contributed by Tommy Thomas

The balance in the account is $199.93 as of February 29, 2016.

SPARTA Financial Report
3/01/2015 through 2/29/2016

INCOME
Opening Balance	289.87
Total Deposits
Donation	50.00
Dues	800.00
TOTAL INCOME	$1,139.87

EXPENSES
Food	634.33
Web Site	123.07
Petty Cash	285.00
Bank Service Charge	0.00
TOTAL EXPENSE	$1042.40

BANK BALANCE Fidelity	97.47
PETTY CASH	102.46
TOTAL CASH	$199.93

Items of Interest

SPARTA Schedule and Menu for 2016

contributed by Tommy Thomas and Chris Blackshire

Mar 1, 2016 - Subs
Apr 5, 2016 - BarBQ
May 3, 2016 - Pizza
June 7, 2016 - Chicken
July 12, 2016 - Subs (avoid July 4 holiday)
Aug 2, 2016 - BarBQ
Aug 30, 2016 - Durham Bulls (your choice of food at the game)
Oct 4, 2016 - Pizza
Nov 1, 2016 - Chicken
Dec 6, 2016 - Subs

IBM launches z13s, entry mainframe with enhanced security

contributed by Chris Blackshire

"The z13s is designed for hybrid cloud deployments and can encrypt and decrypt data twice as fast as the previous version.

IBM on Tuesday launched the z13s, which is a mainframe aimed at mid-sized companies and includes a bevy of security features.

The z13 is designed to bring the mainframe's security practices to hybrid cloud deployments. The security included in the z13s include:

•Cryptography features built into hardware that can encrypt and decrypt data twice as fast as predecessor systems.
•Mainframe security technology that's bundled with IBM security software. IBM is also including its Cyber Security Analytics service to z Systems.
•Security partners for z Systems that include BlackRidge, Forcepoint and RSM Partners.

IBM has continually refreshed its mainframe line for companies that need to crunch transactions at scale. In recent years, the z line has added access to APIs and various microservices.

For IBM, the z13s is the new entry-level mainframe. The systems will be available in March."

See the IBM z13s here.

And review Marna Walle's Practical Tips for the IBM z13s in her SHARE Blog entry.

How Walmart Became a Cloud Services Provider with IBM CICS

contributed by Ed Webb

"The world has changed. With the new cloud options, enterprises no longer must rely only on their IT organization to meet their computing needs. Business units now have options that were not available just a few years ago. They can get some of their needs met by traditional IT processes, and reach out to a cloud provider to meet other needs. The concern is that if you do not meet these needs, someone else will.

This IBM® Redbooks® publication will help you to understand the benefits of becoming your own cloud service provider. It describes a simple approach that allows you to be successful. The main focus of the book is lessons learned from the implementation by an IBM client, Walmart Stores, Inc.®, that achieved impressive results in their efforts to become their own cloud service provider.

Walmart embarked on this journey to help their application developers achieve results that were previously time-consuming and difficult to deliver. In the process, they realized that they had everything that they needed to become a services provider. This book describes the choices that Walmart made, and explains the steps they took to be successful."

Read more about how CICS helped Walmart build a Mainframe Cloud Service in this Redbook.

Read about How Walmart built Mainframe Cloud Services in this other Redbook.

IBM's zEDC brings hardware compression to z systems

contributed by Ed Webb

"Hardware compression is still vital to many enterprises with mainframes. IBM's zEDC hardware data compression feature enables compression for mainframe workloads at potential cost savings."

Read Robert Crawford's TechTarget article here.

Check this zEDC Redbook as well.

Mainstreaming the Mainframe

contributed by Ed Webb

Compuware continues to push the Mainframe platform.

"Like everyone else, you’re being bombarded with content. So you probably read only a fraction of what you encounter. We ask that you approach this document differently, because we genuinely believe it o ers insight that is unique, fact-based, actionable and essential to the success of any company with a mainframe. We also ask that you read it even if you aren’t currently responsible for your company’s mainframe—because, as we argue, that responsibility now needs to become part of mainstream IT.

Key Concepts:
1) The clock is ticking on siloed mainframe teams.
2) IT must respond by rapidly mainstreaming the mainframe.
3) Mainstreaming doesn’t just solve a mainframe problem"

Read this provocative article here .

Humor

The Bagpiper

contributed by Chris Blackshire

Lay down what’s bothering you, breathe in the fresh air and LISTEN to this story.

Time is like a river. You cannot touch the water twice, because the flow that has passed will never pass again. Enjoy every moment of life.

As a bagpiper, I play many gigs. Recently I was asked by a funeral director to play at a graveside service for a homeless man. He had no family or friends, so the service was to be at a pauper's cemetery in the Nova Scotia back country.

As I was not familiar with the backwoods, I got lost and, being a typical man, I didn't stop for directions. I finally arrived an hour late and saw the funeral guy had evidently gone and the hearse was nowhere in sight.

There were only the diggers and crew left and they were eating lunch. I felt badly and apologized to the men for being late. I went to the side of the grave and looked down and the vault lid was already in place. I didn't know what else to do, so I started to play.

The workers put down their lunches and began to gather around. I played out my heart and soul for this man with no family and friends. I played like I've never played before for this homeless man.

And as I played "Amazing Grace", the workers began to weep. They wept, I wept, we all wept together. When I finished, I packed up my bagpipes and started for my car. Though my head was hung low, my heart was full.

As I opened the door to my car, I heard one of the workers say: "I never seen anything like that before, and I've been putting in septic tanks for twenty years."

Apparently, I'm still lost....it's a man thing.

Membership Information

Don’t Forget the Next SPARTA Meeting

Tuesday, March 1, 2016

7 p.m.

Location: LabCorp in RTP

Take I-40 to Miami Boulevard and go north. Turn right onto 1912 T.W. Alexander Drive. Go about a mile or so. Then turn right into LabCorp complex and turn left to the CMBP Building. In the lobby, sign in as a visitor to see Tommy Thomas. Tommy will escort you to the conference room. Use 1912 TW Alexander Drive, Durham, NC 27703 in your map app.

Free Food: Subs, Sodas and Tea, Dessert

Program:

SPARTA Roundtable

Speaker:

SPARTA Attendees

SPARTA News

P.O. Box 13194

Research Triangle Park, NC 27709-3194

First Class Postage

SPARTA Corporate Sponsors: