At the end of December 2023, the eighth functional APAR OA65724 /PTF UJ94340 was released. Like APAR 6, it will be disruptive to existing customers as there are mandatory changes required. New customers to ODP can install easily.
The web based documentation remains at: https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/om-im/5.6.0?topic=z-omegamon-data-provider-part-z-omegamon-integration-monitor
PDF based documentation that covers the different operational environments for each APAR can be found at: https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/om-im/5.6.0?topic=downloadable-pdf-documentation
Breaking changes
ODP uses a variety of open source software “under the covers”. Some of that software needed to be updated to stay within their support windows. ODP Data Broker depends on Zowe. The minimum supported Zowe has been raised from 1.28.2 to 2.12.0. It also leverages the new ZISDYNAMIC plug-in which introduces a new configuration parameter. ODP Data Connect is uses Spring software. Spring software raised the minimum JAVA level from 8 to 17. Data Connect also made some changes in Kafka connectivity and configuration that must be updated for current Kafka exploiters.
Non-Breaking changes
Data Broker has an updated Zowe cross-memory server which is aimed at improving performance. It has also introduced a new Modify system command to dynamically change logging levels for Data Broker network activity.
Data Connect made a number of changes as well. Based on customer requests, secure connections to Kafka can now leverage RACF keyrings as a store type for SSL/TLS communcations. In prior releases, there was a single queue for processing data that was shared by all connected sinks or target analytic servers. Failure or stoppage of one sink could negatively impact the delivery of data to all other sinks. With this release, each sink has it’s own internal queue. This will improve both performance and reliability. There is also a new message, KAYC0084W, that will warn when a queue reaches capacity. With these new queues, the default JAVA Heap size has also been increased.
New exploiters of OMEGAMON Data Provider
Back in September 2023, we wrote about OMEGAMON AI Insights and its ability to provide new knowledge for the OMEGAMON z/OS, Network and JVM agents. In November, IBM introduced a new release of IBM Db2 Query Monitor for z/OS and a new offering, IBM Db2 Automation Expert for z/OS. Each of these is capable of streaming performance related data to analytic servers via ODP. We’ll cover their introduction in a separate blog.
Summary
OMEGAMON Data Provider continues to evolve and its usage among customers is growing rapidly. We’d love to hear about your experiences. One recent testimonial is from Bankdata, but I’m sure others are finding new ways to connect. Within Rocket, I took the eight existing agent dashboards and “mashed” them together into a single workspace. If interested in trying that out, leave a comment. We haven’t put that on GitHub yet, but could do that if there is interest.
As always, our Master Blog is updated with additional information about ODP and OMEGAMON AI Insights. Bookmark that and stay tuned for additional information.
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