How do users benefit from TUC?
TUC automates generation and triggering of DB2 maintenance jobs. It identifies any new object and refreshes the maintenance jobs automatically. Customization options allow the administrator to easily control utilities, objects and resources. Real Time Statistics and thresholds are used to trigger utilities only when needed. TUC clients are taking advantage of the products functionality to automate the DB2 object maintenance tasks and have seen significant reduction in resource consumption:

Speedup BACKUP and RECOVERY
The problem: A bank wanted to start taking image copies on DASD to speed up backup and recovery and to allow mirroring to a recovery site. The DASD pool was too small for daily full backups of the entire DB2 subsystem.
The solution: The bank is using TUC to automate daily backups. Only tables that have been changed are copied. TUC decides if a full copy is necessary based on the rate of changes. TUC helped the bank to identify that, in certain workloads, only a few tables were changed. This way the backup time and the space required for backups were dramatically reduced. Only 6% of the total number of tables actually needed backup. Thus the backup process now only takes 20 minutes.

Optimize REORG
The problem: A bank wanted to be proactive and to identify performance and space problems before they became prominent to users and REORG only the most critical objects without exceeding a limited batch window. Furthermore they wanted to improve performance when accessing large history tables by archiving data that is not in use.
The solution: The bank is using TUC to automate REORGs for a quota of megabytes only for the tables in the most critical condition. TUC collects access performance statistics and can identify if there is a degradation in access performance over time. Unnecessary REORG is avoided, if tables do not suffer from any performance degradation. The bank is using TUC to prune history data by automating REORG DISCARD. The business applications define the conditions for archiving history data. TUC allows recalling archived data or reloading the archived data into history repository. This way the bank is able to decrease the size of large critical tables and improve the access performance to these tables. Backups for smaller tables are also faster. They are able to reduce their REORG process by 30%.

Most recent RUNSTATS
The problem: A large credit card company wanted to ensure that the optimizer is using the most recent statistics and at the same time minimize the CPU cost of statistics collection.
The solution: The credit card company is using TUC to automate statistics collection. The collection frequency is based on the rate of change and the size of the objects. TUC automates REBIND for all dependent packages accessing tables with recently collected statistics to allow the optimizer to choose the best access path for these tables.

Reducing RECOVERY Time
The problem: A credit card company wanted to be ready for any possible recovery scenario, including disaster recovery, recovery to a point in time or rolling back certain changes made to critical tables.
The solution: The credit card company relies on TUC to quickly generate recovery jobs at disaster recovery time. TUC covers all the different aspects of recovery scenarios by allowing easy analysis of the logs with ULT to UNDO changes.

TUC has proven to its existing clients its strength in automating the DB2 object maintenance tasks by improving services to significantly simplify the database administrator routines.

For more information on TUC please see here.

“We need to refresh the test bed data more often but can’t do it in timely and cost effective manner”.

Does this sounds familiar?

Change is unavoidable, but the reasons to push it further into the future are plentiful. There are many obstacles to overcome in making more frequent test data refreshes. Many shops now run 24×7, or pretty close to that, so obtaining consistent data is almost impossible. Copying tables when the data structures of the source and the target are different is a laborious task. Using image copies introduces its own set of limitations. Even seemingly trivial subset selects can require manual intervention and be error prone. Many organizations have implemented strict sensitive data masking policies that must be observed while refreshing test data. The security that surrounds production makes extracting data for test beds lengthy and time consuming. In addition to these technical issues, IT must address the high cost of long running UNLOAD/LOAD jobs.

Here is a top ten list of suggestions for reducing the anxiety, time and cost of refreshing test data.

Better service with less resources

TUC is known as the tool that simplifies DB2 object maintenance. It is equally suitable for the automation of backups, reorgs, statistics collections as for one-time tasks like the recovery or repair of corrupted user tables. Real Time Statistics and thresholds are used to trigger utilities only when needed. TUC identifies any new object and refreshes the maintenance jobs automatically. Customization options allow the administrator to easily control utilities, objects and resources.

We are pleased to announce General Availability of TUC z/OS V2 R2, some highlights:

• Full support for DB2 version 9 and version 10 new features, such as clone tables, partition by growth tablespaces, flashcopy image copies and RUNSTATS profiles.
• Collects access performance counters and can avoid unnecessary reorgs if IO remain optimal.
• Automates the process of continuous monitoring of the log and can generate ULT log analysis jobs. TUC dialogs allows you to display application activity for each objects, and to easily generate recover jobs to the desired point in time. The activity data includes also points of no activity also known as Quiet Points.
• Offers improvements in processing utilities and allows you to process objects by priority, process only indexes and process objects based on a quota of megabytes.
• Allows better integration of utility jobs and application processes. Utility jobs can be triggered synchronously and pending utility requests can be processed continuously.
• Generation and refresh of profiles, jobs and utility statements has been simplified and improvements in performance have been introduced to allow TUC users to quickly generate utility jobs for a large number of objects/databases.

As a database administrator for DB2 for z/OS the pace of change on the DB2 z/OS platform makes your work easier in some ways, more complex in others. Expectations continue to rise and data volumes increase, while batch windows shrink and service level agreements get more scrutiny. Plus there is the persistent pressure to reduce costs and deliver gains more quickly.

What’s needed is a clear path forward for Database management on z/OS. A path that includes better integration, well conceived automation, superior manual control for expert users and built-in intelligence to help newer staff with task based workflows. Clear instructions guide users through functionality and include the information they need to accomplish work quickly, accurately and with confidence. To make these gains possible without suffering negative trade offs requires a revolutionary new approach to database management tooling.

TUC for z/OS sets the stage for managing DB2 more efficiently, more precisely, with less risk and lower resource consumption. This enables better control over the largest most complex DB2 environments. Automation where appropriate and intuitive management of task workflows delivering more value to your organisation. TUC for z/OS users experience superior degrees of control. They can automate when appropriate, but still retain powerful manual control. They also benefit from intelligent software guided assistance on complex tasks when needed.

When doing maintenance on DB2 objects they can be automatically selected based on the task. Users can tailor this list with optional filtering criteria that include name and size.

We understand that while automation is desirable there are times when you need to assert your hands on experience or when a specific situation of level of expertise calls for software assisted control. Useful tools allow for both, for total automation, where users merely specify the ‘policy’ and everything gets automatically arranged and executed, and for a helper mode where staff specifies and the tool fills the blanks. TUC -Total Utility Control stands for both.

Reducing the load on IT resources is another challenge that UBS solution can help address. With the pressure to continue to do more with less, TUC is uniquely positioned to deliver maximum value by helping to postpone expensive hardware upgrades, alleviating CPU, DASD and memory usage, reducing the time spent on tasks and increasing the efficiency of DB2 applications. A recent example is the reduction of CPU load by avoiding unnecessary reorgs through TUC’s Reorg Avoidance Feature.

Through powerful integration TUC provides flexible options to manage DB2 that result in getting more value from tools, staff and available skill sets. For example TUC can invoke ULT4DB2 to perform fast repairs of corrupted user tables or to rapidly setup data forwarding tasks to other DB2 instances or DBMS. TUC also integrates seamlessly with ULT to automatically provide useful audit reports on user tables. Similarly it is able to generate and execute BCV56 copy jobs that migrate DB2 bulk data with unmatched speed and efficiency.

TUC – Total Utility Control simplifies and automates deployment of each and every utility from whichever vendor. Be it IBM with the standard utilities including DSN1COPY or any other vendor. Users specify criteria and thresholds to allow TUC the selection of the most appropriate tool for the task.

To learn more about TUC and how it enables your installation to do more with less please order your individual web demo.

Data Replication & Change Audit

ULT4DB2 is known as an easy to use Log Analysis and Log Tracking Tool for DB2 z/OS. It is equally suitable for Data Propagation to other systems or platforms, for Auditing, and for Data Correction.

Database administration, application development and maintenance programmers use ULT4DB2 to repair the result of an incorrect program execution, a wrongly scheduled job or other user errors. Auditors and administrators deploy ULT4DB2 to determine update sequences. Data centers replace expensive data propagator tools by ULT4DB2 because ULT offers reduced CPU consumption and reasonable license conditions. Database administrators use ULT4DB2 to analyze update frequencies and idle times.

We are pleased to announce General Availability of ULT4DB2 z/OS V1R5.

Some highlights:

• It automates recovery of accidentally dropped objects
• It treats table versioning, i.e. it is able to process log records whose data structure was changed by ALTER TABLE ALTER COLUMN statements
• It is able to process the log records for tables with DATA CAPTURE NONE attribute
• It fully supports DB2 UDB for z/OS Version 10

ULT4DB2 makes dealing with one or hundreds of tables a simple procedure. It provides a number of flexible functions to select and treat many objects simultaneously. Intuitive templates make enforcing naming standards an error free task.

ULT4DB2 is trial friendly, a quick install is followed by a productive execution within minutes. Let results at your site validate why this is a tool worth having.

For further information please check ULT4DB2

BPA4DB2 makes buffer pool tuning easy in DB2 for z/OS – it analyzes measurements, identifies tuning opportunities and provides guidelines and precise instructions for problem solution and tuning practices. This well-designed solution has again been enhanced.

Host Component

The Host Component delivers DB2 performance measurements in a resource-saving sampling technique where the results are stored in a DB2 database.

Enhancements:

• support for DB2 V.10
• improved database design and performance

Workstation Component

The Workstation Component (WC) is BPA4DB2′s graphical user interface that communicates with a measurement repository stored in a host DB2 subsystem. The WC displays any adverse findings per measurement, gives clear and detailed instructions on how to react, and offers a rich selection of graphical and tabular representations of the analyzed subsystems’ performance status.

Enhancements:

• message filters and message IDs, which make the handling of BPA4DB2′s notifications more convenient to user
• PDSE datasets are used for generated Alter Bufferpool statements, one member per bufferpool.
• templates for PDSE dataset names
• displays high water mark of pool usage in bufferpool survey screen
• for easier identification includes measurement date and time in tab panels

Host Examination Component

Using regular batch snapshots this component offers permanent surveillance for any upcoming performance or availability issues. It proactively highlights actions regarding buffer pool and threshold related issues that otherwise might develop into serious availability problems. Professionals are relieved of the ongoing observation process for potential IO or Bufferpool issues. The component automatically assesses the measurement data and alerts the user by email.

Enhancements with additional rules regarding:

• the synchronous IO percentage for sequential IO operations
• the minimum page residency time
• the maximum page residency time
• the update rate of data pages written to DASD

Full information coverage can be found at: http://www.ubs-hainer.com/bpa4db2