The International DB2 User Group (IDUG) conference was last week and one of the great traditions is talking with all the DB2 vendors at the conference. Getting the latest information and understanding of their product strategies, directions and enhancements can be great for planning your database infrastructure future support activities. The following are three areas that can help improve your DB2 10 for zOS migration efficiencies dealing with all the daily DBA and application developer issues.
First, find out the currently supported versions, releases and PTF levels of your vendor products. Also find out the correct release level for each product you need for your DB2 10 for zOS migration. As I have talked about before, there are many ways to do your DB2 10 for zOS migration. There are many pre-migration checklists, INFO APARs and other helpful items on my DB2 Resources page. All of these items detail DB2 10 for zOS migration information. Try to get the same information from each of your DB2 third-party vendors to see how their software works with DB2 10.
Next, understand which DB2 vendor products are vital to your everyday operations and survival. Develop a testing plan for each of your vendor utilities, tools and interfaces. Even testing the IBM DB2 support products may result in an interesting story to tell when detailing your DB2 10 for zOS migration issues. Also, during your DB2 10 for zOS migration planning, it is a good time to consolidate any extra IBM DB2 or third-party vendor libraries. Scan your JCL libraries to discover all the different or non-standard libraries your DBAs and developers are using so that they can update their jobs to the correct DB2 10 for zOS libraries once the migration has been completed.
Finally, since you are doing your DB2 10 for zOS migration there are probably some new features you want to exploit. For a long time IBM has published a checklist for their products that indicates the best release for your IBM support products to achieve success with your DB2 10 for zOS migration. This checklist shows what version, release and PTF level of the various IBM products supported with DB2 10 for zOS, which will tolerate the migration and which will exploit the DB2 10 for zOS migration. Getting this type of software version information from your DB2 third-party vendors is vital, even if they are not as public about as IBM.
Again your DB2 10 for zOS migration may have many different third-party product support issues and getting good information about all your supporting products is vital. Start your budget planning and campaigning to go to next year’s IDUG conference in Orlando, April 29 through May 3.
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Also Craig Mullins has a new DB2 10 version of his DB2 Developer’s Guide. The book is in its sixth edition and has a lot of good DB2 information. Check it out on Amazon at http://amzn.to/CraigMDB2Book.
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Dave Beulke is an internationally recognized DB2 consultant, DB2 training and DB2 education instructor. Dave helps his clients improve their strategic direction, dramatically improve DB2 performance and reduce their CPU demand, saving millions in their systems, databases and application areas within their mainframe, UNIX and Windows environments.
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