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A step change in development efficiency

white paper

Enterprise Developer® for zSystems®1 Technical White Paper

WHITE PAPER | A step change in development efficiency

PAGE 1

INTRODUCTION

The development process for mainframe applications is no simple matter – it is far more than just cutting code and testing it. Improving technology is only half the story and failure to support key processes will severely impact developer adoption. This paper explains how Micro Focus can help development teams improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the zSystems development processes by customizing the Eclipse Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and the specifics of mainframe configuration management integration.

For specific product information please also see the Micro Focus Enterprise Developer Data Sheet and supporting white papers: www.microfocus.com.

The reality of mainframe development

Whether you are using Enterprise Developer Connect or Enterprise Developer for IBM© zSystems to develop mainframe applications on Windows, or connected to your host environment2, or tools such as IBM’s Rational Developer for z® – your development process is more than just edit, compile, debug and test. The process is typically complex with parallel streams of development involving a whole host of tools, such as source configuration management, test management, third party tools and databases. This complex workflow must be integrated into your Eclipse development environment to ensure that your programmers can work efficiently, productively and use the tool 100 percent of the time.

However, integrating non-standard tools and processes into Eclipse can be difficult and time consuming. This requires a new set of development skills and a fulltime resource, usually a consultant, to maintain and manage the resulting ad hoc infrastructure. The result can be an incomplete integration of the Eclipse development environment into to your existing development workflow. This impacts on developer adoption and very often means that developers have to go back to mainframe eroding productivity gains.

THE MICRO FOCUS SOLUTION

Micro Focus Enterprise Developer family of products provides a range of robust and unrivalled technology to greatly improve development efficiency, providing a blend of state-of-the-art contemporary tooling with full support of and integration with vital mainframe processes and 3rd party tools.

Embedded within this technology is a simple to use, centrally-configurable graphical modelling capability called Application Workflow Manager. It enables users to quickly customize the Eclipse-based user interface and directly integrate tools, such as source control, either directly on the mainframe or on the workstation. Customizing the development environment ensures the swift integration of familiar development workflows.

KEY BENEFITS

Application Workflow Manager ensures:

Full control over customizing the Enterprise Developer Eclipse IDE without resorting to JAVA plug-in development or expensive consulting resource. Customizations made through Worflow Manager are easy to maintain and do not require specialist skills

Affordable, comprehensive and deep integration with your mainframe development process and tools including home grown or third party mainframe tools

Out-of-the-box packages for full integration of software configuration management

Faster developer acceptance and less training on the new environment meaning you can realize productivity gains sooner as the development process can be fully implemented in a single development interface

Central configuration of any customizations allows for distribution to your development teams. Updates are available at next IDE login and don’t have to be installed on individual developers desktops

Workflow Manager is also available as an Eclipse plug-in to organizations that have deployed the IBM RDz toolset.

www.microfocus.com


FEATURE OVERVIEW

Graphical tools for customizing your development environment

Application Workflow Manager is a graphical modelling environment that supports the easy customization and extension of the Enterprise Developer or RDz Eclipse IDE by enabling the following:

Implement custom tree and table structures as well as filter and property views

Create new graphical input, output and selection dialogs

Configure context menu actions, buttons and menu functions to drive workstation and mainframe tools from the Eclipse IDE

Combine complex development workflows into a single user action by merging individual actions into a single step

Customizing the IDE to develop on and off the mainframe

Application Workflow Manager puts you in control. You can customize your development IDE under Enterprise Developer without resorting to costly JAVA plugin development. This configuration can be centrally maintained by a few key users who can optimise the developer experience and ensure that all developers get the latest updates the next time they start the IDE.

Mainframe ISPF dialog integration3

Using the Application Workflow Manager Interactive System Productivity Facility (ISPF) panels can be automatically integrated graphically into the Enterprise Developer IDE. This means that there is no need to change mainframe ISPF programs or procedures and important steps in your mainframe development cycle are now accessible from a single development IDE. Your developers will not have to go back to the mainframe to complete tasks previously only available through a TSO session. Supported features include:

ISPF DISPLAY Panels

ISPF Table Display

ISPF Help Panels

ISPF Message Display

ISPF Editor or Browse calls routed to the Enterprise Developer Eclipse Editor.

Out of the box ISPF applications are available directly in Eclipse through a graphical interface.


With Workflow Manager the graphic layout of ISPF panels can be customized to for example make table panels scrollable and easier to use. Plus if an ISPF application is called which in itself calls an ISPF panel then the panel fields are automatically mapped to the modelled dialog.

This level of flexibibility ensures that you can easily customize home grown processes and tools driven off ISPF panels on the mainframe, directly into the development workflow managed thropugh Eclipse.


Deep integration into software configuration management

The software configuration management system is central to the development lifecycle. This drives the development and release of software updates to the business. To be effective, software configuration management needs to be part of the development process and accessible from the development IDE.

Micro Focus provide direct integration with key mainframe software configuration management systems by providing packages which allow out-of-the-box integration directly into the Eclipse IDE. These packages include all the IDE customizations and mainframe integration points to fully support all development and administrative source configuration functions. Integration is available for:

CA Endevor® Software Change Manager.

Serena ChangeMan ZMF including Enterprise Release Option (ERO)

IBM Software Configuration and Library Manager (SCLM)

Each package consists of:

The definitions, workflow and Eclipse User Interface customizations to support the relevant software configuration management functions. These are defined and maintained within the Application Workflow Manager which means these can be easily customized to suit your unique requirements

Customizable mainframe REXX procedures that provide the integration with mainframe software configuration management modules

Tightly integrated mainframe software configuration management means that developers have full access to tools and projects on and off the mainframe, from a single development environment. Additionally, it allows full access to windows and controlled sources and packages, all from a single Eclipse perspective. An intuitive graphical interface means even novice developers can easily adopt an organization’s development process by:

Navigating Source libraries and packages with a graphical tree view

Reviewing software components, version and dependencies lists

Creating and run filter views to search for software components

Getting access to all available versions of a source member

Editing members directly in the Enterprise Developer Eclipse editor taking advantage of features like outline view, content assist, and background parsing, to identify syntax errors instantaneously. This helps in reducing mainframe CPU usage by avoiding unnecessary source control builds

Check-out to a mainframe partitioned data set or directly to a local Enterprise Developer project off the mainframe to take advantage of zero waiting times for syntax and source build functions. Integrated error feedback means errors can be quickly isolate and fixed without having to remember compiler messages or line numbers.

All functions are context sensitive, which means that only those actions applicable to a stage in the development cycle are available. Your developers can now maximize the productivity gains of an Eclipse based development environment but keep the flexibility and familiarity of a development process controlled by the mainframe software configuration management system.

CA ENDEVOR® SOFTWARE CHANGE MANAGER

Features specific to the Endevor® Software Change Manager integration include:

Step-by-step navigation into an Endevor® environment using the Team Developer tree view

Step by step navigation to Endevor elements which are associated to a specific Change Control Identifier (CCID)

Directly creating Endevor element lists in a table view by defining and managing Endevor database search-criteria

Facilities to managing Endevor packages


Endevor element functions such as:

Create, Retrieve, Add, Edit, Browse, Delete, Generate, Move and Transfer

Displaying element information such as changes, history and listing,

Master Display

Show element components in a table view supporting the Browse component function

Show element and component levels in a table view

Directly editing an Endevor element which means

Implicit execution of the Retrieve and Add function

Directly Editing an element listed in the Endevor Map and saving it in the development stage

SERENA CHANGEMAN ZMF

Features specific to the Serena ChangeMan ZMF integration include:

Step-by-step navigation into a ChangeMan application using the Team Developer tree view

Directly creating ChangeMan package or component lists in a table view by defining and managing ChangeMan database search-criteria

Managing ChangeMan packages from within Eclipse including:

Package functions like Create, Freeze, Audit, Promote, Selective Promote, Demote, Revert, Approve and Back-out

Check-out components from the baseline or promotion libraries into packages

Check-in components from private libraries into packages

Access to ChangeMan component functions which include:

Create, Edit, Browse, Delete, Build and Lock

Displaying package versions (SSV), promotion and component history, source/load dependencies, called by relationship, listings, and bill of material.


SERENA CHANGEMAN ERO

If the ChangeMan ERO option is in use the Serena ChangeMan ZMF integration includes the following additional features:

Step-by-step navigation into a ChangeMan release using a Team Developer tree view hierarchy

Creating ChangeMan release lists directly into a table view by defining and managing ChangeMan database search-criteria for releases

Displaying packages associated with a release

IBM SCLM

Features specific to the IBM SCLM integration include:

Step-by-step navigation into an SCLM project using the Team Developer Tree View

Directly creating SCLM member lists in a table view by defining and managing SCLM database search criteria for members, member versions, or member dependencies

All SCLM member functions – such as Edit, Build, Promote - are available

Fully integrated search-for support capability – for creating SCLM member lists in a table view by searching for text strings within the SCLM source members. If a member is viewed or edited from such a member list the relevant text lines containing the search string are marked

SCLM dependencies analysis: a powerful feature that uses the SCLM dependencies analysis to create an SCLM member list with all dependent SCLM members. This function is available for SCLM architecture definitions as well as for any other SCLM controlled source member

Generating SCLM architecture definitions. This feature supports an easy and customizable way to generate SCLM, compile and link architecture definitions

Draw-down support. You can directly edit a member which is listed in the SCLM hierarchical view and save it in the SCLM development group.


CONCLUSION

The development process for mainframe applications is no simple thing – it is far more than just cutting code and testing it. Improving technology is only half the story and failure to support key processes will severely impact developer adoption.

By using Enterprise Developer for zSystems (or the plug-in available for RDz) you can ensure that your developers have access to tried and trusted development processes, mainframe configuration management and the tried and trusted workflow directly within an eclipse IDE. This means they can take full advantage of a modern development environment that unifies your development teams and provides access to integrated editing, compiling and debugging. Couple this with the ability to work directly on the mainframe or to take advantage of zero wait times by developing under Windows means faster adoption and a quicker return on investment.

The unique capabilities in Enterprise Developer for zSystems, including Application Workflow Manager puts you in control, allowing you to centrally customize your development environment without reliance on complex Eclipse JAVA plug-in development or expensive consulting resources.

To find out more please see the Micro Focus Enterprise Developer Data Sheet and supporting white papers: www.microfocus.com

References1 Formerly known as zEnterprise

2 Enterprise Developer Connect allows you to develop directly on the mainframe from an Eclipse IDE. Enterprise Developer for zSystems allows you to develop on both the mainframe or off the mainframe under Windows from the same Eclipse based IDE.

3 Available under Enterprise Developer Connect or Enterprise Developer for zSystems only

www.microfocus.com


About Micro FocusMicro Focus, a member of the FTSE 250, provides innovative software that allows companies to dramatically improve the business value of their enterprise applications. Micro Focus Enterprise Application Modernization, Testing and Management software enables customers’ business applications to respond rapidly to market changes and embrace modern architectures with reduced cost and risk.

For additional information please visit: www.microfocus.com© 2015 Micro Focus Limited. All rights reserved. MICRO FOCUS, the Micro Focus logo, among others, are trademarks or registered trademarks of Micro Focus Limited

or its subsidiaries or affiliated companies in the United Kingdom, United States and other countries. All other marks are the property of their respective owners.

IBM and zEnterprise are registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation. WPASCDE0215

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