BMC APPLICATION RESTART CONTROL for IMS

Automate batch processing. Implement application checkpoints with no code changes.

Many organizations run a significant amount of work in batch mode, but shrinking windows shorten the time available to run batch jobs. When a batch job fails, it must be restarted at the point of failure or at the beginning of the job (after recovery of affected databases and files). It is not practical to back out everything and start from the beginning because backing out updates from can take twice as long as running the application. Nor is it practical to restart from the wrong point, then back out errors and start over again. The only way to restart at the point of failure is to ensure that the application takes periodic checkpoints of the contents of application working storage areas.

BMC solution

BMC APPLICATION RESTART CONTROL for IMS (AR/CTL for IMS) enables you to implement batch checkpoint/restart capabilities and control checkpoint frequency so that you can resume batch applications from the most recent checkpoint rather than from the beginning of the job step. It resets the working storage areas after a batch job failure. Faster restarts minimize contention between batch jobs and online processing. You can often implement the checkpoint/restart mechanism with no changes to application code or jobs.  BMC AR/CTL for IMS helps you helps you determine the best balance between performance, restart time, and checkpoint overhead by controlling the checkpoint frequency outside the application. 

Features and benefits

• Requires no JCL or application program changes in most cases
• Significantly reduces programming efforts to convert batch applications from DLI to BMP, to migrate from non-DBRC to DBRC, and to migrate IMS applications to DB2
• Provides checkpoint frequency control outside of application code - you determine the best balance between performance, restart time, and checkpoint overhead
• Provides automation to eliminate many SOC7 abends (due to bad input data) and to react to database contention (U0777 abends) and eliminate associated failures from the batch schedule
• Enables suspend and resume – you can interrupt a batch job so that another process can initiate, then automatically resume batch job processing
• Provides checkpoint restart for programs that don't use the IMS extended checkpoint restart facility and/or GSAM
• Automatically invokes IMS log close and batch backout of DLI programs after a failure

Key differentiators

• Early Termination - you can terminate a batch job at the next checkpoint
• Automatic Reattach - can intercept an abend and automatically restart the batch job, which is useful when the batch job is the ‘loser’ in a deadlock situation
• Integration with BMC MAXM Reorg/Online for IMS – suspends BMPs to enable reorganizations with virtually no outage
• Integration with BMC Backup and Recovery Solution for IMS – takes static image copies and establishes quiesced recovery points without cancelling a BMP
• Integration with BMC APPLICATION RESTART CONTROL for VSAM - synchronizes VSAM and IMS update processing
   

Related Products

• BMC Backup and Recovery Solution for IMS
• BMC MAXM Reorg/Online for IMS