App Connect

Recently IBM App Connect released IBM App Connect Enterprise 11.0.0.11, which included a number of new capabilities. One of the great features introduced was the Db2 driver is now included in the shipped binaries. This enables you to configure App Connect Enterprise to connect directly to Db2 without having to install the Db2 client, this is even more valuable in App Connect Enterprise certified containers where custom images are normally required to add the Db2 Client. 

Below are instructions on how you can use this new capability in an Integration Server created by the App Connect operator. Before continuing I would recommend reading the blog linked above to understand how the new capability works. 

Configuration

The configuration breaks down into 4 configurations.

odbc.ini

This is supported as a primary configuration type. Create a file with the contents of the odbc.ini such as;

[ODBC Data Sources]

USERDB=IBM Data Server Driver included in ACE
;# IBM Data Server Driver included in ACE

[USERDB]
DRIVER=/opt/ibm/ace-11/server/ODBC/dsdriver/odbc_cli/clidriver/lib/libdb2o.so
Description=IBM Db2 ODBC Database accessed using IBM Data Server Driver included in ACE
Database=USERDB

[ODBC]
InstallDir=/opt/ibm/ace-11/server/ODBC/drivers
UseCursorLib=0 
IANAAppCodePage=4
UNICODE=UTF-8

odbcinst.ini

This is already configured in the container and is located in /opt/ibm/ace-11/ie02/etc

db2cli.ini

Create a file called "db2cli.ini" with the following contents updating the details accordingly

[USERDB]
Hostname=9.145.146.224
Port=50000
Database=USERDB

setdbparms

Create a file called "setdbparms.txt" with the following contents updating the details accordingly

mqsisetdbparms -w /home/aceuser/ace-server -n USERDB -u <userId> -p <password>

Deploy Configurations

Create the odbc configuration type. Pipe the odbc.ini file into base64 to get a base64 encoded version of the file i.e. cat odbc.ini | base64. Create a file (`odbcini.yaml`) with the following contents, taking the base64 output and update the following file in the data sections

apiVersion: appconnect.ibm.com/v1beta1
kind: Configuration
metadata:
  name: db2-odbcini
  namespace: mynamespace
spec:
  data: <InsertDataHere>
  description: Configuration for Db2 
  type: odbc

Deploy the configuration using oc apply -f odbcini.yaml

Next zip up `db2cli.ini` into a file called `extensions.zip`. Pipe the zip file into base64 to get a base64 encoded version of the file i.e. cat extensions.zip | base64. Next we need to create an "extension" configuration type, create a file (`generic.yaml`) with the following contents, taking the base64 output and update the following file in the data sections

apiVersion: appconnect.ibm.com/v1beta1
kind: Configuration
metadata:
  name: extensions.zip
  namespace: mynamespace
spec:
  data: <InsertDataHere>
  description: Files for configuring Db2
  type: generic

Deploy the configuration using oc apply -f generic.yaml

Next pipe setdbparms file into base64 to get a base64 encoded version of the file i.e. cat setdbparms.txt | base64. Next we need to create a "setdbparm" configuration type, create a file (`setdbparms.yaml`) with the following contents, taking the base64 output and update the following file in the data sections

apiVersion: appconnect.ibm.com/v1beta1
kind: Configuration
metadata:
  name: db2-creds
  namespace: mynamespace
spec:
  data: <InsertDataHere>
  description: Configuration for Db2 
  type: setdbparms

Deploy the configuration using oc apply -f setdbparms.yaml


Deploy and Configure Server

Next we need to create an integration server with the configurations attached by adding the following

Once the integration has started up, patch the deployment with the extra environment variable needed by the Db2 client:

oc set env deployment/<isName>-is DB2CLIINIPATH=/home/aceuser/generic

After applying the patch command the deployment should create new integration server pods which are fully configured and ready to connect to Db2.
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#ACEV11
#acecc
#AppConnectEnterprise(ACE)
#Db2