Configuring CICS Applications for Native Database File Handling

To move your existing data files from disk to a database, you need to use the dbfhdeploy command line utility to deploy them to a datastore. Once deployed, you need to configure your CICS environment to locate them within the datastore.

Whether you are creating a new resource or updating an existing one, the database file handling-specific changes are the same: you need to update the file path within the FCT that details the file, to point at the new datastore location. The following example is using the ACCTFIL file, which is stored in the VSAM folder within the CICS datastore:

For more details on the notation used, see the data category in The dbfhdeploy Command Line Utility.

Additionally, if your file is transactional (as indicated above by the selected Backward Recovery option), you must also configure an XA resource within the enterprise server region that points to the datastore in which the file is stored; see the Create an XA Resource topic within the Configuring Datastores section for your database type.

You do not need to make any code changes to your CICS application's source code to use files within a datastore.

If the enterprise server region running your CICS environment terminates abnormally whilst any data files are open, Enterprise Server attempts to recover the files automatically. If you continue to receive errors accessing files (for example, file locked statuses), run the dbfhadmin command line utility to recover the files.