COMPUTER SCIENCE PROGRAM - King Abdullah University of

16 Pages·2012·0.16 MB·English

by  Simon J Reid

ASG-Manager Products™ Roadmap, Version 2.0
ASG is pleased to present plans for the development of ASG-Manager Products™1, integration
with ASG’s other metadata management products, and resolution of customer enhancement
requests.
Introduction
ASG’s direction for Manager Products is based on our understanding of our customers’
technology direction. While of course there are many variations, the central trend is for our
customers to:
• Continue to utilize z/OS mainframes as a base for critical enterprise activities
• Develop major strategies and infrastructure initiatives in line with those set by IBM
• Increasingly focus development activities around tools based on the Eclipse Platform
• Utilize distributed systems for ancillary and departmental activities
In that context, the major themes of our Manager Products roadmap are:
• Elimination of architectural roadblocks, so that the repository can be extended to
accommodate modern languages and technologies
• Support interoperability and interchange with ASG’s other metadata technologies, to
allow enterprise-wide management from a Manager Products hub
• Provide modern user interfaces to support both the power user and business user of
metadata
The following sections describe our intentions. Where a requirement is carried forward from
the Statement of Direction published in 2005, the relevant requirement identifier is noted.
Roadmap Overview
Manager Products release MPR2700 is nearing code completion, and will then enter an
extended period of quality assurance, with a targeted release in Q2 of 2007. As MPR2700
enters QA we will begin development of the next mid-point release, MPR2710. This release
will be focused on the delivery of the majority of support for DB2 V9, and on the provision of
a Java API comparable in style to the JDBC interface (as opposed to the current command
level API) to be the basis for many Manager Products extensions and the working together of
Manager Products and ASG-Rochade. Based on our current research of this release, we
anticipate code completion in Q4 of 2007 and general availability in Q1 of 2008.
MPR2710 will be followed, approximately 12 months later, by MPR2800 which will deliver
functionally complete DB2 V9 support and the next phase of items envisaged in this statement
of direction.

1 Referred to as “Manager Products” in the rest of this document.
Architectural Issues
Support for our clients emerging environments requires significant architectural change in
Manager Products. We will make changes in the core facilities, and then exploit those
facilities in the product line in subsequent phases, as guided by customer needs. We presently
foresee the following requirements:
• Completion of Extended name support.
Additional features in RIM handling (Common attributes, UDA, reporting) will be
completed in MPR2700.
MPR2710 will deliver a Java API which will provide the architectural basis for complete
extended name support. Implementations in particular Manager Products components will
be scheduled in consultation with our customer community.
• The following architectural enhancements are envisaged for MPR2800 and beyond:
o Modeling support for name space structures
o Improved modularization.
User Interfaces
The perspective on user interfaces is changing. We see a transition to sophisticated developer
requirements, broadly available browser-based facilities and service based facilities. We
intend to take the following steps:
• Utilizing the Java API delivered with MPR2710, we will create an Eclipse2-based interface
for Manager Products, thus providing support for the emerging dominant developer
environment.
• We will provide, in parallel with MPR2710, an updated WebEnabler release, which will
include a review of items deferred in the previous statement of direction (see appendix
B). Beyond this, we will also move towards integration of WebEnabler and ASG-
WebAccess.
• The emergence of the Eclipse platform has, effectively, isolated ManagerView. We will
continue support and error correction, but have no present plans for a new release.
Database Management System Support
Support for Database Management Systems is fundamental to the value of Manager Products.
The following is our direction in this area:
• Provision of standard facilities for
o DB2 (mainframe) -- currency (including D24 DB2 V9 support) and exploitation of
recent developments. As discussed above, DB2 V9 support will be delivered in two

2 Eclipse is an open source community whose projects are focused on providing a vendor-neutral open
development platform and application frameworks for building software -- http://www.eclipse.org
phases. It is complex, and some features require architectural support. The first
phase will include:
(cid:131) Support for new data types
(cid:131) Import from UDB System Catalog
(cid:131) SQL DDL Import
o The following items will be deferred to later phases. The sequence below reflects
our current view of priorities, but we expect to be guided by our customers:
(cid:131) Complete UNICODE Support
(cid:131) XML Support
o We recognize that there may be features that our customers see as valuable but
which we have not planned. We expect to tune our intentions as we and our
customers get experience in using DB V9 features.
• UDB – Currency and UDB V8 for Unix/Windows – Phase 1 (D23)
• IMS
• Oracle
• Support for Microsoft SQL Server
• Sybase Support
Programming Language Support
We recognize that the range of programming languages in use is changing and that the basic
program structure is in transition. In recognition of this, we envisage the following:
• Extension of the Manager Products metamodel to support Object-Oriented programming
languages.
• Create an interface to the ASG CAE (Common Analytical Engine) as a means of expanding
metadata sources available to Manager Products.
• Support of data base procedural code.
Extended Metadata Support
The third essential component of the metadata environment, supplementing database
technology and programming languages, is derived from data warehousing, modeling and
Business Intelligence tools. To support this requirement, we have the following under
consideration:
• Generic XML support -- Import of XML formatted data that contains data that can be
mapped via schema or generic/customizable rules into the RIM structure.
• A generic approach to sharing of metadata with ASG-Rochade, to allow exchange of
metadata and parallel operation of mainframe-hosted Manager Products and distributed
Rochade implementations.
Developer Facilities
Our customers tend to integrate Manager Products deeply in their production environments.
To support customer extensions we will:
• Deliver a Java API comparable in style to the JDBC interface (as opposed to the current
command level API).
• Publish an XML interface.
• Provide a web services interface.
Supported Releases
In the statement of direction published in 2005, we noted that over the last five years, the
delivery cycle of Manager Products has shortened to 12-18 months while the length of support
for a given release has not materially changed with a result that the number of supported
releases had increased, imposing an additional support workload. We announced at that time
that we will take the opportunity to reduce the number of supported releases. Our first steps
will be
1. Withdraw support of MPR2500 at the release of MPR2700.
2. After sufficient take-up of MPR2700 withdraw MPR2510 from support.
As MPR2700 provides fundamental support for many new Manager Products features, ASG
encourages customers to adopt it as quickly as possible.

ASG Product Management Department
November 2006
Appendix A: Change and Enhancement Request Review
ASG has a formal process for managing change and enhancements, managed through ASG-
Impact®, ASG’s consolidated service desk solution. Customers may request enhancements by
contacting ASG’s Customer Support Department or by using ASG’s Intelligent Support Portal.
As part of preparing this road map, ASG has reviewed all outstanding change and
enhancement requests for Manager Products. The status is as follows.
Completed Enhancements
The following enhancements have been delivered or will be delivered in the forthcoming
MPR2700 release in addition to its major functionality. For reference we provide the release
which responded to the request.
Request Description Release
Number
00002623 MPR->WEBENABLER: FIRST COMMAND AND 2520
LOGON
00015438 THERE ARE INCONSISTENCIES IN TERMS UNDER 2520
THE ENVIRONMENT HEADING.
00015439 IN OBJECT SEARCH, THE OBJECT TYPES 2520
SHOULD BE ALPHABETICAL
00002264 GETTING MMR-HELP VIA THE WEBENABLER 2600
00002313 MPR->WEBENABLER: AUTO LOGON 2600
00008491 SEARCH BUTTON IN SEARCH SCREENS BY 2600
DEFAULT SELECTED
00008492 ALL SEARCH SCREEN SHOULD HAVE AN 2600
IDENTICAL LAYOUT
00008494 ADD EXITS TO SEARCH SCREENS TO INSERT 2600
JAVA SCRIPTS VALIDATE INPUT
00017848 MPR->2610 DELIVERY OF EXEC MPMMDIAG 2600
UNCLEAR
00018169 MPR->2610 ASG-WEB ENABLER 2610 -
INFORMATION NEEDED REGARDING 2600
AUTOLOGIN TO WEBENABLER VIA COOKIE -
ENHANCE DOCUMENTATION TO FULLY
DESCRIBE THIS FEATURE
00018296 MPR->2610 ASG-WEB ENABLER SP1 - REPLACE 2600
THE 'CONTINUE' MESSAGE BY A 'STOP' MESSAGE
IN THE NEXT SERVICE PACK 2
00018863 MPR->2610 ASG-WEB ENABLER CGI VARIANT -
COMMUNICATION BETWEEN OPEN EDITION 2600
Request Description Release
Number
AND MVS (CALL_MMR.REXX AND REXXMSPI)
SHOULD BE EXPLAINED IN DETAIL IN THE
DOCUMENTATION
00002443 COUNTER OF EDIT BUFFER CANNOT GO PAST 2610
64000
00005105 MPR->CICS: SUPPORT NEEDED FOR CURRENT 2610
CONTROLMANAGER RELEASE
00008552 SHOW STATUS STRUCTURE IN A DIAGRAM 2610
00002225 DB2 PRODUCE COBOL FOR SQL ALWAYS 2700
GENERATES A SUFFIX
00002855 CAN DMEX1 BE EXECUTED IN THE CLIENT 2700
ENVIRONMENT
00002933 USER DEFINED FUNCTION RUN ON SERVER NOT 2700
ON CLIENT
00003008 MPR->DB2: HELD-AS ENHANCEMENT 2700
00003113 OPTIONS OPTHINT PATH AND DBPROTOCOL 2700
ARE NOT AVAILABLE
00003114 ATTRIBUTES OF DB2-PROCEDURE NOT 2700
DOCUMENTED
00003217 AS IDENTITY CLAUSE NEEDED FOR DB2-TABLE 2700
00004377 MPR->USAGE POINTER TO GEN BAL A-TYPE 2700
00005898 OC1 ABEND DURING STARTUP OF A TSO 2700
SESSION FOR MPR
00015351 MPR->PROCL: SENDF, NO DATASET STATISTICS 2700
WHEN WRITING TO A PDS
00015717 DOCUMENTATION MPRQS26_XML.PDF: SYNTAX 2700
DIAGRAMS SHOULD FOLLOW PUBLICATION
CONVENTIONS
00015812 EXTRACT DB2 VIEW SQL PARSE FAILED FOR 2700
COMPLEX EXPRESSION
00015831 (CER) EXTEND HELD-AS HEXADECIMAL FROM 2700
512 TO 32 K
00015832 MPSF PRIORITY FACILITY SHOULD ASSIGN 2700
BATCH PRIORITY TO UI AND TSO PROGRAMS
RUNNING IN BATCH
00015843 RECONCILE SHOULD IGNORE NON-EXISTING 2700
MEMBERS AND REFERENCES
00016551 THE DOCUMENTATION DOES NOT CONTAIN 2700
Request Description Release
Number
DETAILED INFORMATION ABOUT THE BASIC
VARIABLES AFTER A DACCESS - ESPECIALLY NO
INFORMATION CAN BE FOUND THAT THE
VARIABLE MEMBER_TYPE IS CONTAINING THE
MEMBER'S STANDARD-LITERAL
00017038 MPR->2610 USER ABEND 940 FOR MPAID LIST 2700
ALL-CONC ONLY EC1060 IF R/O MPAID USED
AT SECOND SERVER WITHOUT DIV REFRESH
BUT MEANWHILE UPDATED AT FIRST SERVER
00017241 MPR->2610 PLEASE CORRECT/EXTEND ASG- 2700
MANAGER PRODUCTS DOCUMENTATION
MPASUG26.PDF PDF PAGE 50
00018052 MPR->2510 HELD-AS 1 CHARACTERS 40000 K 2700
USAGE BLOB NOT ALLOWED, BECAUSE
MAXIMUM LENGTH VALUE IS ONLY 32767
00018053 MPR->2610 (CER) EXTEND HELD-AS 2700
HEXADECIMAL FROM 512 TO 32 K
00018782 MPR-> IMPORT SOLUTION SQL DDL 2610 - 2700
IMPORT OF DB2 INDEX MUST =USE THE
CORRECT ITEM VERSION FOR THE COLUMN
00019177 MPR->2610 PLEASE CORRECT ASG-MANAGER 2700
PRODUCTS DOCUMENTATION MPDRUG261.PDF
PDF PAGE 460 - MAXIMUM OF 16 ALIASES NO
LONGER VALID
00019178 MPR->2610 PLEASE CORRECT ASG-MANAGER 2700
PRODUCTS DOCUMENTATION MPDSSA261.PDF
PDF PAGE 036 - MAKE DOCUMENTATION FOR
IS/BASED-ON UNEQUIVOCAL
00019179 MPR->2610 PLEASE CORRECT ASG-MANAGER 2700
PRODUCTS DOCUMENTATION MPDSSA26.PDF
PDF PAGE 045 - MULTIPLE-VALUES FOR
IDENTIFIED KEYWORD ATTRIBUTE
00019292 SINGLE GENERATION FOR AUPD SKELETONS 2700
SHOULD BE POSSIBLE IN BATCH VIA UX
Accepted Enhancement Requests
The following enhancements have been planned for delivery. For reference we provide the
release in which we intend to respond to the request.
Request Description Release
Number
00002713 MPR->SHOULD DM02817E REALLY BE A W 2710
INSTEAD OF AN E
00009451 MPR->SLG: 2600 PRODUCE COBOL COMMAND 2710
TO ALLOW AN 'INCLEVEL' OPTION
00010129 AMEND DELETE OCCURRENCE … CLAUSE 2710
00015830 ALIGNED NOT GENERATED DESPITE RNDBIT 2710
CHANGE IN MACRO DGPLI
00016480 MPR2610 KEYWORDS MAXDEC AND RJCONTN 2710
FROM SHOW PRODUCE-OPTIONS FOR COBOL
ARE NOT DOCUMENTED
00016481 MPR2610 KEYWORDS MAXBIN AND MAXDEC 2710
FROM SHOW PRODUCE-OPTIONS FOR PL1 ARE
NOT DOCUMENTED
00016817 MPR-> CER: PROPOSALS TO 2710
DOWNLOAD/UPLOAD
00018342 MPR->2610 RESPONSE TIME IN THE VERSION OF
WEB-ENABLER USING SERVLET IS TOO LONG 2710
COMPARED WITH THE OLD VERSION
00018553 MPR-> EXTENDED NAMES SUPPORT IN 2710
WEBENABLER 2.7.0
00019168 MPR->2600 PRODUCE IMS DBDGEN ON IMS 2710
DATABASE - SUPERFLUOUS DBD FIELD
CONTROL STATEMENTS GENERATED
Deferred Enhancement Requests
The following enhancements are accepted for future consideration, but are not yet assigned
to specific releases.
Request Description
Number
00003433 POSSIBILITY TO ENLARGE THE TEXT AREA CONT
THE NAME
00004503 PROD PL/I CALCULATES WRONG LENGTH
00008493 MULTIPLE SELECTION OF OBJECT-TYPES IN
SEARCH SCREEN
00009798 MMR->DB2: SUPPORT FOR DECENTRALISED DB2
Request Description
Number
SYSTEMS
00009799 MPR->DB2: SEPARATE OUT THE DB2 FACILITIES
SO THEY CAN BE UPGRADED INDEPENDENTLY
OF THE FULL PRODUCT
00015435 DOCUMENTATION CHANGES FOR THE ASG-WEB
ENABLER USER’S GUIDE
00015436 IF YOU CLICK ON WORKPLACE IN THE
NAVIGATION TREE, A WINDOW APPEARS WITH
LINKS TO COMICS WEB SITES
00015437 IF YOU CLICK ON SAMPLE HTML FORM IN THE
NAVIGATION TREE, THEN SUBMIT, THE BOX AT
THE UPPER RIGHT CONTAINS THE TEXT “4 ME”
AND WHAT APPEARS TO BE A RED DEVIL
GRAPHIC
00015441 IN WEB ENABLER, ON THE TABULATOR BAR
UNDER SEARCH IS AN OPTION CATALOG, BUT IT
IS SPELLED “CATALOGUE” ON THE PAGE THAT
APPEARS WHEN YOU CLICK ON IT
00015814 DB2 IMPORT: NO REP FOR TABLES WITH
DIVERGING TABLESPACE
00015815 DB2 IMPORT: MORE DETAILED CHECK FOR
PRESENT COLUMNS
00015817 DB2 IMPORT: BETTER CHECK OF EQUIVALENT
FORMATS
00015818 DB2 IMPORT: EXISTING NON-DB2 ATTRIBUTES
SHOULD AUTOMATICALLY BE KEPT
00015930 MVW DOES NOT ALLOW RELATIONSHIP-TYPE AS
TARGET
00016658 MPR-> DATAMANAGER HOW TO FIND RIGHT
OPTION FOR GET 'DEPENDING ON' CLAUSE IN
PRODUCE COBOL FROM 'FILE DEFINITION'?
00016816 MPR->2700 IMPROVEMENT OF USE AND
HANDLING OF MEMBER (INDEX) NAMES WITH
LOWER CASE CHARACTERS (AND OTHER
CHARACTERS FROM THE EXTENDED CHARACTER
SET)
00016852 MPR->2600 IMPORT SOLUTION SQL: VERSIONING
OF ITEMS FAILS IF IMPORTED FROM ONE SINGLE
SOURCE
Request Description
Number
00016853 MPR->2610 PLEASE CORRECT ASG-MANAGER
PRODUCTS DOCUMENTATION MPSLPG261.PDF
PDF PAGE 40
00017368 ALLOW AN ATTRIBUTE TYPE TO BE COMMON
OPTIONAL FOR THE WHOLE HIERARCHY AND AT
THE SAME TIME BE DEFINIED IN CERTAIN
MEMBER TYPES AS MANDATORY
00017440 MPR->WHEN USING HUPD-FUNCTION FOR ITEM
IS THERE A WAY TO CONTROL THAT THE USER
ONLY CAN ADD NEW VERSIONS TO HELD-AS
FORMAT BUT NOT CAN MAKE ANY CHANGES TO
HELD-AS THAT ALREADY ARE THERE ?
00017688 MPR->2610 ASG-WEB ENABLER SHOULD
PROVIDE MEMBER-TYPE SPECIFIC SETTINGS IN
HTTPCONF FOR SPECIALIZED MEMBER-TYPE
DEPENDENT REPORTS AS AN ALTERNATIVE TO
OBJECT REPORTS (BOTH ARE NEEDED)
00017829 MPR->2610 IMPORT SOLUTION SQL DDL -
EXISTING VIEW/TABLE MEMBERS SHOULD BE
CONSIDERED ON IMPORT
00017956 RE-NAMING A RELATIONSHIP NAME LEADS TO
CHANGING THE VERB (CLASS) INSTEAD
00018168 MPR->2610 ASG-MANAGER VIEW - CHANGE
REQUEST: IT SHOULD BE POSSIBLE TO ASSIGN A
QUERY AUTOMATICALLY TO A CERTAIN SCHEMA
- ADVANTAGE: SCHEMA WILL NOT HAVE TO BE
EXPLICITLY CHOSEN
00018360 MPR->2610 IMPORT SOLUTION SQL DDL -
PREVIEW SHOULD HANDLE STRING-DELIMITERS
CORRECTLY AND MORE FLEXIBLY
00018378 MPR->2610 PLEASE EXTEND ASG-MANAGER
PRODUCTS DOCUMENTATION MPASUG26.PDF
PDF PAGE 12, 40 ETC. - SYNTACTIC NOTATION
NOT EXPLAINED
00018510 MPR->2610 ASG-WEB ENABLER - THERE SHOULD
BE TWO SEPARATE MEMBER-TYPE LISTS FOR
CREATE AND FOR SEARCH TO INDEPENDENTLY
CONTROL WHICH OBJECT-TYPES POPULATE
THESE LISTS