Now that HP delivered Express 3 enhancements, just try to install them It’s not as automatic as you might think, even if you’re using the Patch/iX and Stage/iX patching programs. HP shipped the Express 3 tapes as promised during the month of November, and it didn’t take long before users were reporting enhancements like ODBCLink/SE and LISTF additional functionality weren’t on the tapes. Relax. The enhancements are in there, but if you’re updating using Patch/iX – a really good idea, given the complexity of patching without it – you need to do an extra step to get the extra goodies that are on Express 3. Be sure to force qualify the patches. See, since they’re enhancements, HP figures they’re not mission-critical, so they label these patches differently than say, one that keeps your network on its feet after somebody PINGs it from a Windows 95 client. HP’s Response Center reports that Patch/iX will not automatically “Qualify” enhancements, so customers must “force qualify” them manually before you create your CSTL tape. Apparently HP believes many sites are on older releases of some subsystems, and if Patch/iX automatically installed the enhancements that could cause trouble. We’re a little confused here at the NewsWire, because we thought that the Express concept was to get all the up-to-date patches installed in minutes. As it stands now, a customer has to go through the Patch/iX qualification screen patch-by-patch, going to the detail screen for each one to see if it says “enhancements must be forced” and then forcing them manually. Here’s our opinion: in choosing to protect the stability of all systems, the process has hampered Patch/iX and its potential to make a tedious, nerve-wracking job easier. It’s not immediately apparent what patches are the long-awaited enhancements, either. Managers report that a documentation page named “Software Products and Dependent Patches” doesn’t say which ones are enhancements. The Response Center says the following patches are the seven additional enhancements, which managers must “Force Qualify” in order to use: ATCJXQ6A, the B-tree indices for HP 3000 databases (see an article on how to put them to work in this issue); SQLJXR2B, which is Allbase/SQL A.G2.00 and provides ODBCLink/SE capability along with TIXJXU4A, another TurboIMAGE patch; COBJXW6A, a new version of COBCAT.PUB.SYS.; MPEJXR6C, the new LISTF,ACCESS feature; ODIJXJ0B, online diagnostics for new hardware; and OFDJXK5C, enhanced offline diagnostics. Some users are recommending that HP offer a single “qualify enhancement patches” switch in the process in future Express releases, which could be specified at the start of using Patch/iX to define the method of qualifying enhancement patches. Another alternative is to bypass Patch/iX and apply the Express release using AUTOINST, which will qualify both enhancements and bug fixes. We’re seeing something of a disconnect between differing parts of HP, those that designed and maintain Patch/iX and those that are “labelling” patches. Still a few bugs in that release, too Once you get your enhancements installed, you will want to keep an eye out for some unexpected behavior in upgrades to File Transfer Protocol and the Command Interpreter. Most vexing might be the improved FTP/iX, which HP has been working on for some time to get it to behave more like the rest of the world of FTP clients and servers on non-3000 systems. The specifications behind FTP are supposed to mandate an agreed-upon set of commands so servers and clients exchange data regardless of who did the design of the operating systems. Unfortunately, the newest FTP/iX isn’t choosing the widest supported set of commands. Crack cross-platform customer and part-time MPE/iX software designer Mark Bixby reports that the new FTP client will handle a download request of get foobar by sending a rename from command. Non-3000 systems out there don’t always support that command, and the resulting error messages confuse the MPE FTP client, which gives up without completing the download. Prior to Express 3, FTP/iX didn’t operate this way. Bixby says “this MPE client change violates the Principle of Least Astonishment – that is, I find it very astonishing that the client is attempting a no-op rename on the server when all I want is just a read-only download.” Bixby added that HP said the new FTP process has something to do with 3000-to 3000 file transfers, and right now there is just one code path in the client to deal with both 3000 servers and non-3000 servers. The workaround is to go back to reinstall any pre-Express 3 FTP client and server software you may have been using. “If anybody else is FTP-ing with unusual remote systems, you should definitely test things after installing Express 3,” Bixby adds. Meanwhile, NewsWire subscriber Mike Berkowitz reported problems with the CI enhancement known as LISTF, ACCESS. He says doing a LISTF,8 or 9 on a file for which you lack permission to see the accessors generates a CIWARN 194, which can cause a job to flush if there is no CONTINUE in front of the LISTF. The problem is already noted in HP SR 5003-397489. Berkowitz adds that “listf, anymode may get a new ‘lockcontention warning’ and not show on the LISTF. This error has nothing to do with anyone using the file, so the ‘lock’ is misleading. It also sets a warning that causes FSERR 0, CIERR 425, and a job to blow.” The second bug is addressed in SR 5003-394221. Jeff Vance, author of the LISTF, ACCESS enhancements, said that that lockcontention warning is “a result of changes made to LISTF and LISTFILE to not wait infinitely for certain file system (internal) semaphores. This affects all formats except 0 and 6. Also, my understanding is that you need a reasonable file system load to encounter this problem.” Vance has gone to work on the problems, whose solution will be submitted as another 5.5 patch. Now that you’ve got ODBC access, use it to learn about it There’s a boatload of ODBC driver solutions out there in the customer base by now, as the 3000 community goes to work getting its favorite server to talk with the latest, 32-bit clients. But just because ODBC is a standard for database connectivity doesn’t mean it behaves in a standard way. For example, there’s the problem of getting Approach 97 to connect into and use IMAGE databases. NewsWire subscriber Joe Geiser of client-server integrator CSI reports that “Approach is not ‘ODBC friendly’ at all, and a product I would not recommend to anyone. I’ve always had problems with it. Some drivers work well with it , mostly the PC drivers such as FoxPro and Access, but the drivers for the bigger databases tend to be problematic.” Just because a product is from the founder of the ODBC standard doesn’t mean it works at all with that standard. The moral is don’t assume the problem lies in the driver, regardless of whose client you’re using. Geiser also reported that some aspects of Visual Basic 5.0 aren’t behaving as expected with many ODBC drivers, and the fault doesn’t appear to lie in the driver providers’ hands. Geiser said the new VB 5.0 feature ODBCDirect in both the Pro and Enterprise editions, and RDO in Enterprise edition don’t connect using most ODBC drivers out there. This is new functionality that the suppliers of the middleware need to engineer, so Geiser advises that for the time being you should “stick with ODBC via Microsoft JET for the time being, until the drivers catch up.” Then there’s the whole issue of security Considering the impact of giving many PC-based users capability to write to your company’s production databases through Access or Excel may keep you awake nights. Some sites are opting for read-only access through ODBC, using the version of Minisoft’s ODBC/32 driver set that doesn’t have write capability yet. Subscriber Thomas Genute of NYLCare said that he’s not going to rely on security at the ODBC driver level. “The databases we access are used mainly through a COBOL application which has security and determines who can see or update. ODBC can be dangerous since it depends on MPE and IMAGE security only. I prefer not to implement write access via ODBC.” Minisoft reports that not having write access in its driver hasn’t slowed sales the way they anticipated. Mike Sweeney of the firm says they’ve used some of that time to test ODBC/32 against other clients, such as the new 6.0 version of Crystal Reports, Impromptu and Brio, among others. ODBC functionality still requires this kind of house-to-house testing, usually on the part of the middleware providers. Since everybody has a demo process in place, it’s a good idea to get a tool in-house and deploy it using your clients before assuming it will work, especially if you use the very latest clients or out-of-the-way applications. If you’re one of the few people that hasn’t heard about the limitations of the included ODBC middleware on Express 3, we’ll recap them for you: no native IMAGE access (needs Allbase/SQL versions G2.nn); won’t support KSAM, flat files, Powerhouse dictionaries or multiple threading (one database at a time, please); and is only 95 percent ODBC 2.0 compliant. You’ll be able to choose from all the available ODBC on the 918DX next month All of the released ODBC middleware solutions for HP 3000s are now represented on the new Series 918DX developer’s system, with the inclusion of M.B. Foster Associates’ DataExpress including ODBCLink. That means there will be four different middleware packages for database connectivity when HP starts to take orders for the systems in January. Three 918DXs were in beta test as we went to press. That’s a little later than first promised, but response to the offer – which supplies an HP 3000 loaded with HP software for a lease of less than $250 a month – has been so healthy that Steven Little of CSY said his job has changed to accommodate all the interest. Unison’s shareholders approved the Tivoli merger, but Roadrunner will continue The shareholders at Unison formally voted to accept the merger deal that Tivoli offered this fall. Unison’s marketing chief Chuck Stern assured us earlier that the Roadrunner backup product does have a place in the merged company, so customers shouldn’t worry. The approval doesn’t come as much of a surprise, since a significant part of the shareholders are officers of the company, but you never can tell these days. Most important is that the merged company will continue its commitment to MPE software, including the 3000 version of Maestro. And why not? Major HP 3000 customer Southwest Airlines, with 60 systems installed, recently signed a deal to use Maestro to manage the work on all of its systems, including the dozens of 3000s running the Southwest Ticketless application. (See our January issue for more details) That MDX enhancement is on its way While all of the focus has been on DDX in the past month – if you use dynamic detail expansion in your databases, read our page one story – the work on giving the same capability to master datasets has begun to surface. HP is now saying it’s getting MDX ready for an Express 5 release of MPE/iX 5.5, expected sometime in January or February. MDX is working in test sites now, an enhancement that needs study in action in addition to the test suite kind of work the labs do well. Copyright 1997, The 3000 NewsWire. All rights reserved.