Named counter pools

A named counter is stored in a named counter pool, which resides in a list structure in a coupling facility. Each pool, even if its list structure is defined with the minimum size of 256 KB, can hold up to a thousand named counters.

You create a named counter pool by defining the coupling facility list structure for the pool, and then starting the first named counter server for the pool. Pool names are of 1 to 8 bytes from the same character set for counter names. Although pool names can be made up from any of the allowed characters, names of the form DFHNCxxx are recommended.

You can create different pools to suit your needs. You could create a pool for use by production CICS® regions (for example, called DFHNCPRD), and others for test and development regions (for example, using names like DFHNCTST and DFHNCDEV). See Named counter options table for information about how you can use logical pool names in your application programs, and how these are resolved to actual pool names at runtime.

Defining a list structure for a named counter server, and starting a named counter server, is explained in the CICS System Definition Guide.