Upgrading between releases with CICS continuous delivery
CICS® continuous delivery provides new functions, capabilities, and technologies between product releases through the service channel or as separate downloads. To take advantage of such additional functions, apply the service APARs (rather than upgrading the release level).
Maintenance to WebSphere® Application Server Liberty is delivered through fix packs periodically. For your convenience, Table 7 lists service APARs that CICS has released to bring its embedded Liberty JVM server to the latest WebSphere Application Server Liberty fix pack level.
Upgrade actions
You can choose to deploy the function on specific CICS regions or across CICSplexes. You can also implement the function on lower-level CICS systems, if supported. Some features are further controlled by the selective use of feature toggles.
- Decide which features to apply.
Use the following tables to plan for additions of function to your CICS environment. A brief introduction is included for some features.
Note: Features are listed in chronological order, with the most recent additions at the bottom.- For Java™, OSGi, and Liberty, Table 1 shows additions of CICS Liberty features through continuous delivery, and Table 2 lists all other features.
- Table 3 lists continuous delivery features for CICS web services.
- Table 4 lists continuous delivery features for CICS policies.
- Table 5 lists continuous delivery features related to security.
- Table 6 lists all other CICS continuous delivery features.
To learn more about any of the continuous delivery features, see the What's new information for your CICS release, or click the link provided with the APAR to view the APAR details in the IBM Support Portal. See Table 1 in Planning to upgrade for links to the What's new information for supported releases of CICS TS.
- If any of the features are managed by feature toggles, decide which ones to enable. See Specifying feature toggles.
Features for Java, OSGi, and Liberty
- CICS Liberty features
-
Table 1 shows, by release, additions of CICS Liberty features through continuous delivery. Some Liberty features are made available to in-service CICS releases with CICS APARs that bring CICS-embedded Liberty JVM server to the latest WebSphere Application Server Liberty fix pack level.
Table 1. Continuous delivery for Liberty features, by release of CICS Transaction Server for z/OS CICS Liberty feature 5.5 5.6 6.1 6.2 adminCenter-1.0
PH08321 BASE BASE BASE beanValidation-2.0
cdi-2.0
javaee-8.0
javaMail-1.6
jaxrs-2.1
jsf-2.3
jsonb-1.0
jsonp-1.1
servlet-4.0
webProfile-8.0
PH15017 BASE BASE BASE springboot-1.5
spring boot-2.0
BASE BASE BASE BASE microProfile-1.3
microProfile-1.4
microProfile-2.0
microProfile-2.1
microProfile-2.2
microProfile-3.0
microProfile-3.2
microProfile-4.0
microProfile-4.1
Not applicable BASE BASE BASE To view the complete list of CICS Liberty features that are supported by your CICS release, follow these links:
- Other features
-
Table 2. Other continuous delivery features for Java, OSGi, and Liberty, by release of CICS Transaction Server for z/OS Feature 5.5 5.6 6.1 6.2 - New JVM server profile option
com.ibm.cics.jvmserver.trace.specification
- Use this option to filter package and class trace from the JVM server.
PH11496 BASE BASE BASE - Support for EXEC CICS LINK to a Spring Boot application running in a Liberty JVM server
- You can add the
@CICSProgram
annotation to a method on a Spring bean. When the application is started in Liberty, a CICS program definition is dynamically created. Then, the Spring Boot application can be invoked by any CICS program through an EXEC CICS LINK call.
PH14856 BASE BASE BASE - Support for Java EE 8 Full Platform in integrated-mode Liberty in CICS
- By using the embedded version of IBM® WebSphere® Liberty (Liberty), CICS TS supports applications that are written to the Java Enterprise Edition (EE) 8 Full Platform specification in integrated mode. Java EE 8 includes many new and enhanced APIs, such as JSON processing, RESTful web services, authentication by using custom identity stores, and JavaMail.
PH15017 BASE BASE BASE - Support for Jakarta EE 8 Platform
- The Jakarta EE 8 full platform technologies and specifications are an evolution of Java EE 8, allowing developers and applications to easily transition from Java EE to Jakarta EE.
Not applicable BASE BASE BASE <applicationManager autoExpand="true"/>
is applied as a default Liberty configuration setting but is not visible in server.xml.- This setting causes application file archives to be automatically expanded into the
${server.config.dir}/apps directory on first use. This avoids expansion of file
archives into the Liberty work area on server startup, reducing zFS file I/O and making more
efficient use of the Java shared class cache. If you wish to
override this setting and switch it off, then you should place the XML element:
<applicationManager autoExpand="false"/>
in your server.xml file.
PH28793 PH28793 REMOVED Not applicable - New JVM server profile option
Features for CICS web services
Features for CICS policies
Feature | 5.5 | 5.6 | 6.1 | 6.2 |
---|---|---|---|---|
|
PH07632 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
Ability to specify Transaction ID and User ID conditions for policy task rules | PH26145 | PH26145 | BASE | BASE |
New policy task rule type, container storage | Not applicable | PH29187 | BASE | BASE |
New policy system rule type, transaction dump threshold | Not applicable | PH34348 | BASE | BASE |
New option to set the WLMHEALTH time interval is supported by the Set z/OS WLM health open status system rule action | Not applicable | Not applicable | PH58295 | BASE |
Features for CICS security
Feature | 5.5 | 5.6 | 6.1 | 6.2 |
---|---|---|---|---|
|
PH59546 | PH59546 | PH59547 | BASE |
|
PH49253 | PH49253 | PH49261 | BASE |
|
PH50175 | PH50175 | PH51719 | BASE |
|
PH45703 | PH38091 | BASE | BASE |
|
Not applicable | Not applicable | PH60212 | BASE |
|
PH55369 | PH55369 | PH55370 | BASE |
|
PH20063 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
All other continuous delivery features
Feature | 5.5 | 5.6 | 6.1 | 6.2 |
---|---|---|---|---|
|
OA56111, OA56806, and OA56807. | BASE | BASE | BASE |
|
PH09381 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
|
PH07596 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
Support for IBM SDK for Node.js - z/OS, V12.0 | PH18618 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
|
PH16392 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
|
PH22136 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
|
Not applicable | PH28145 | BASE | BASE |
|
Not applicable | PH28145 | BASE | BASE |
|
PH30252 | PH30252 | BASE | BASE |
|
Not applicable | PH30590 | BASE | BASE |
|
PH03691 | PH03691 | BASE | BASE |
Support for passing XID to Db2 | PH39766 | PH39766 | PH47996 | BASE |
Improved temporary storage expiry processing | Not applicable | APARs PH40863 and PH40409 | BASE | BASE |
CICS support for WebSphere Application Server Liberty fix packs
Table 7 shows all the CICS APARs that provide support for Liberty fix packs. Only some of these fix packs enable new Liberty features; the others are simply ongoing maintenance. If the fix pack enables new Liberty features in CICS, these features are listed in Table 1.
IBM WebSphere Liberty fix pack version | 5.5 | 5.6 | 6.1 | 6.2 |
---|---|---|---|---|
18.0.0.3 | PH05401 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
18.0.0.4 | PH07871 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
19.0.0.3 | PH09600 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
19.0.0.6 | PH13560 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
19.0.0.9 | PH16415 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
19.0.0.12 | PH19704 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
20.0.0.3 | PH21613 | BASE | BASE | BASE |
20.0.0.6 | PH25960 | PH25960 | BASE | BASE |
20.0.0.9 | PH28793 | PH28793 | BASE | BASE |
20.0.0.12 | PH31589 | PH31589 | BASE | BASE |
21.0.0.3 | PH33137 | PH33137 | BASE | BASE |
21.0.0.6 | PH37946 | PH37946 | BASE | BASE |
21.0.0.9 | PH39936 | PH39936 | BASE | BASE |
21.0.0.12 | PH42501 | PH42501 | BASE | BASE |
22.0.0.3 | PH44531 | PH44531 | BASE | BASE |
22.0.0.6 | PH46518 | PH46518 | PH46518 | BASE |
22.0.0.9 | PH49182 | PH49182 | PH49182 | BASE |