Redpaper
Cisco FICON Basic Implementation
In this IBM® Redpaper we discuss the basic steps to configuring a switch for
FICON® in both switched point-to-point and cascaded configurations. We use
Fabric Manager (FM) and Device Manager (DM) to perform all configuration
steps.
We discuss some basic FICON/mainframe steps that you will need to perform. It
is not our intent to show any of the steps on the mainframe, but we highlight the
considerations.
Important: Although this paper shows the screen capture flow from a Fabric
Manager/Device Manager 3.0(3) installation, the flow equally applies to the
latest release of FM/DM 3.2.(1).
Jon Tate
© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008. All rights reserved.
ibm.com/redbooks
1
Hardware configuration definition
An I/O configuration defines the hardware resources that are available to the
operating system and the connections between these resources, which include:
Channels
ESCON/FICON Directors (switches)
Control units
Devices
You must define an I/O configuration to the operating system (software) and the
channel subsystem (hardware). The Hardware Configuration Definition (HCD)
element of z/OS® combines hardware and software I/O configuration under a
single interactive user interface. HCD also performs validation checking, which
helps to eliminate errors before you attempt to use the I/O configuration.
The output of HCD is an I/O definition file (IODF). An IODF is used to define
multiple hardware and software configurations to the z/OS operating system.
When you activate an IODF, HCD defines the I/O configuration to the channel
subsystem, the operating system, or both. With the HCD activate function or the
MVS™ ACTIVATE operator command, you can make changes to the current
configuration without having to perform an initial program load (IPL) on the
software or power-on reset (POR) of the hardware. Making changes while the
system is running is known as dynamic configuration or dynamic reconfiguration.
You select your I/O configuration when you:
POR
IPL