TRANSACTION-INITIATED BATCH PROCESSING

• US 20080275944A1
• Filed: 05/04/2007
• Published: 11/06/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 05/04/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Lau, Kin, D'Angelo, Dario, Smith, Alan Ray
• Granted Patent: US 7,958,188 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2379 Updates performed during online database operations; commit processing

Abstract

A system and method is provided for initiating batch processing on a computer system from a terminal. The method generates a message from the terminal, where the message defines a transaction to be performed on a computer system. The transaction schedules and runs a program that extracts data from the message. The message is then transmitted to the computer system. The data is then used to generate batch job control language and a batch job is run on the computer system. The output of the batch job is then routed back to the terminal.

Claims

1. A method for initiating batch processing on a computer system from a terminal comprising:

generating a message from said terminal, said message identifying a transaction to be initiated on a computer system, said transaction scheduling and running a program that extracts data from said message;

transmitting said message to said computer system;

using said data to generate batch job control language;

running said batch job on said computer system; and

routing said output of said batch job to said terminal.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising the step of using a transaction management system of said computer system to run said program.

3. The method of claim 2 further comprising the step of determining which ones of a set of job control language skeletons to include in said job control language.

4. The method of claim 2 wherein said computer system includes an IMS database system.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein said computer system includes a z/OS operating system.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein said terminal is web-based.

7. The method of claim 4 further comprising using IMS Connect to pass said message to said transaction management system.

8. The method of claim 3 further comprising mapping data from said message into said job control language skeletons, and generating a job control language stream from said job control language skeletons.

9. The method of claim 8 further comprising using a message processing region job control language component to submit said job control language stream to said computer system.

10. A computer implemented method for initiating batch processing in a mainframe computer system comprising:

receiving a request to perform a batch process from a client terminal, said request including data;

extracting said data from said request;

mapping said data into a job control language (JCL) skeleton;

generating batch job control language for said JCL skeleton;

running said batch job on said computer system to generate an output; and

returning said output to said client terminal.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein said request originates from a terminal not having a mainframe userid.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein said request originates from a web-based terminal.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein said batch job control language is generated in a message processing region job control language module.

14. The method of claim 12 further comprising the step of using a transaction management system of said computer system to run said program.

15. The method of claim 14 further comprising the step of determining which ones of a set of JCL skeletons to include in said JCL.

16. The method of claim 15 wherein said computer system includes an IMS database system.

17. The method of claim 16 wherein said computer system includes a z/OS operating system.

18. The method of claim 17 comprising using a message processing region job control language component to generate said job control language.

19. The method of claim 18 comprising IMS Connect component for connecting said terminal to said computer system.

20. An article of manufacture for use in a computer system having a transaction management system tangibly embodying computer instructions executable by said computer system to perform process steps for generating response to a message containing a batch job request from a web-based terminal, said process steps comprising:

reading said message;

parsing said message to extract data;

mapping said data onto a job control language (JCL) skeleton;

formatting an output of said mapping process so that it can be submitted to web-based users;

generating a set of batch JCL streams; and

submitting said JCL streams to said transaction management system.

21. The article of manufacture of claim 20 wherein said process steps further comprise determining which ones of a set of JCL skeletons to include in said JCL.

22. The article of manufacture of claim 20 wherein said terminal is web-based.

23. The article of manufacture of claim 20 wherein said process steps further comprise mapping data from said message into said JCL skeletons, and generating a JCL stream from said JCL skeletons.

24. The article of manufacture of claim 23 further comprising using a message processing region JCL component to submit said JCL stream to said computer system.

25. The article of manufacture of claim 20 wherein said transaction management system is a CICS transaction management system.

26. A computer system comprising:

a database;

a server computer coupled to said database;

a client computer coupled to said server computer through the internet;

a database management system coupled to said server computer and to said database having a message processing region, said database management system including a message processing region containing an application program and a control region containing a message queue;

said client computer including a program for providing a message from said client computer to said message queue, said message defining a batch job transaction to be performed on said server computer;

wherein said transaction schedules and runs a program that extracts data from said message, said data being used to generate batch job control language, said batch job control language being used to run said batch job on said server computer; and

said server generating an output from said batch job and transmitting said output to said client computer through said internet.

27. The system of claim 26 wherein said server computer further comprises an application program including a message reader that associates a transaction name defined in said message to the name of an application within said application program.

28. The system of claim 27 wherein said application program further comprises a message parse and job control language (JCL) mapping module for parsing said message, generating JCL for invoking batch processing and mapping variables from said message into said JCL.

29. The system of claim 28 wherein said message parse and JCL unit dynamically accepts character strings from said message to be used to identify parameters or components to be mapped into JCL skeletons.

30. The system of claim 29 wherein said application program further comprises an output formatting unit for formatting said output such that it can be routed to specified web-based userids.