Implementing IBM CICS JSON Web Services for Mobile Applications

Implementing IBM CICS JSON Web Services for Mobile Applications

by Rufus Credle, Andy Armstrong, Chris Atkinson, Russell Bonner, Geoff Pirie, Inderpal Singh, Nigel Williams, Matthew Wilson, Mark Woolley
Released November 2013
Publisher(s): IBM Redbooks
ISBN: 9780738438900

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Book description

This IBM® Redbooks® publication provides information about how you can connect mobile devices to IBM Customer Information Control System (CICS®) Transaction Server (CICS TS), using existing enterprise services already hosted on CICS, or to develop new services supporting new lines of business. This book describes the steps to develop, configure, and deploy a mobile application that connects either directly to CICS TS, or to CICS via IBM Worklight® Server. It also describes the advantages that your organization can realize by using Worklight Server with CICS.

In addition, this Redbooks publication provides a broad understanding of the new CICS architecture that enables you to make new and existing mainframe applications available as web services using JavaScript Object Notation (JSON), and provides support for the transformation between JSON and application data. While doing so, we provide information about each resource definition, and its role when CICS handles or makes a request.

We also describe how to move your CICS applications, and business, into the mobile space, and how to prepare your CICS environment for the following scenarios:

  • Taking an existing CICS application and exposing it as a JSON web service

  • Creating a new CICS application, based on a JSON schema

  • Using CICS as a JSON client


This Redbooks publication provides information about the installation and configuration steps for both Worklight Studio and Worklight Server. Worklight Studio is the Eclipse interface that a developer uses to implement a Worklight native or hybrid mobile application, and can be installed into an Eclipse instance. Worklight Server is where components developed for the server side (written in Worklight Studio), such as adapters and custom server-side authentication logic, run.

CICS applications and their associated data constitute some of the most valuable assets owned by an enterprise. Therefore, the protection of these assets is an essential part of any CICS mobile project. This Redbooks publication, after a review of the main mobile security challenges, outlines the options for securing CICS JSON web services, and reviews how products, such as Worklight and IBM DataPower®, can help. It then shows examples of security configurations in CICS and Worklight.

Table of contents

  1. Front cover
  2. Notices
    1. Trademarks
  3. Preface
    1. Authors
    2. Now you can become a published author, too!
    3. Comments welcome
    4. Stay connected to IBM Redbooks
  4. Part 1 Introduction and architecture
  5. Chapter 1. Introduction
    1. 1.1 Overview
    2. 1.2 Business value
    3. 1.3 Solution overview
    4. 1.4 Solution architecture
    5. 1.5 Usage scenarios
    6. 1.6 Integration of CICS and other IBM products or solutions
    7. 1.7 Supported platforms
  6. Chapter 2. CICS use of mobile technologies
    1. 2.1 REST
    2. 2.2 JSON
    3. 2.3 Existing support in CICS for mobile
      1. 2.3.1 Atom
      2. 2.3.2 SOAP web services
    4. 2.4 New mobile support in CICS
      1. 2.4.1 JSON with feature pack
  7. Chapter 3. CICS and IBM Worklight
    1. 3.1 Overview
    2. 3.2 Introduction to IBM Worklight
      1. 3.2.1 The Worklight platform
      2. 3.2.2 Further reading
    3. 3.3 Using Worklight with CICS
      1. 3.3.1 Architecture overview
  8. Chapter 4. Patterns for JSON in CICS
    1. 4.1 CICS as a JSON web service provider
      1. 4.1.1 Starting with an existing application (bottom-up)
      2. 4.1.2 Starting with an existing JSON interface (top-down)
    2. 4.2 CICS as a client for JSON web services
      1. 4.2.1 Integrating other JSON web services into your CICS application
      2. 4.2.2 How CICS supports acting as a client for JSON web services
    3. 4.3 Handling JSON in other CICS applications
  9. Part 2 Setup and configuration
  10. Chapter 5. Configuring CICS for the example scenarios
    1. 5.1 Comparison with SOAP web services
    2. 5.2 CICS as a service provider
      1. 5.2.1 How CICS processes a request
      2. 5.2.2 How to configure CICS as a service provider
    3. 5.3 CICS as a JSON client
  11. Chapter 6. IBM Worklight configuration
    1. 6.1 Worklight Studio
    2. 6.2 Worklight Server
  12. Chapter 7. Security and workload management
    1. 7.1 Security overview
      1. 7.1.1 Security principals and concepts
      2. 7.1.2 CICS security options for JSON web services
      3. 7.1.3 CICS mobile security topologies
      4. 7.1.4 Worklight security
      5. 7.1.5 DataPower security
      6. 7.1.6 IBM Endpoint Manager for Mobile Devices
    2. 7.2 Configuring security for JSON web services
      1. 7.2.1 Configuring the URIMAP
      2. 7.2.2 Configuring the TCPIPSERVICE
    3. 7.3 Worklight security configuration
      1. 7.3.1 Configuring HTTP basic authentication in Worklight
      2. 7.3.2 Configuring SSL in Worklight
    4. 7.4 Workload management overview
    5. 7.5 Workload balancing
    6. 7.6 TCP/IP load balancing techniques
      1. 7.6.1 Port sharing
      2. 7.6.2 Virtual IP addressing
      3. 7.6.3 Sysplex Distributor
    7. 7.7 JSON web services and business logic: A multi-region approach
  13. Chapter 8. Problem determination
    1. 8.1 Introduction
    2. 8.2 Deployment problems
    3. 8.3 Problems with the JSON assistants
      1. 8.3.1 DFHJS2LS
      2. 8.3.2 DFHLS2JS
    4. 8.4 Problems with requests to JSON web services
  14. Part 3 Application development and scenarios
  15. Chapter 9. Language structure to JSON schema scenario
    1. 9.1 General insurance sample application
    2. 9.2 Use case for language structure to JSON
    3. 9.3 Language Structure to JSON schema solution
      1. 9.3.1 Identifying the COBOL programs and copybooks
      2. 9.3.2 Tailoring DFHLS2JS for the COBOL customer programs
      3. 9.3.3 Submitting the DFHLS2JS JCL
      4. 9.3.4 Enabling the JSON Request URI
      5. 9.3.5 Test that the JSON request can be successfully performed
  16. Chapter 10. JSON schema to language structure scenarios
    1. 10.1 JSON web services: Request-Response and RESTful
    2. 10.2 JSON web services: A use case
    3. 10.3 Request-Response JSON web service implementation
      1. 10.3.1 Reviewing the JSON schema
      2. 10.3.2 Mapping the JSON schema to language structures
      3. 10.3.3 Submitting the DFHJS2LS JCL
      4. 10.3.4 Developing the CICS wrapper application program
      5. 10.3.5 Defining the CICS resources
      6. 10.3.6 Testing the application
    4. 10.4 RESTful JSON web service implementation
      1. 10.4.1 Reviewing the JSON schema
      2. 10.4.2 Mapping the JSON schema to language structures
      3. 10.4.3 Submitting the DFHJS2LS JCL
      4. 10.4.4 Developing the CICS wrapper application program
      5. 10.4.5 Defining the CICS resources
      6. 10.4.6 Testing the application
  17. Chapter 11. Developing a simple JSON web service client application
    1. 11.1 Overview of the solution
      1. 11.1.1 The scenario
      2. 11.1.2 The solution
      3. 11.1.3 The linkable interface for transforming JSON
    2. 11.2 Writing the JSON schema
      1. 11.2.1 Writing the request schema
      2. 11.2.2 Writing the response schema
    3. 11.3 Generating the language structures
    4. 11.4 Defining the CICS resources
      1. 11.4.1 Defining the BUNDLE resources
      2. 11.4.2 Defining the URIMAP resource
    5. 11.5 Developing the application program
      1. 11.5.1 Transforming the request data
      2. 11.5.2 Sending the request
      3. 11.5.3 Transforming the response body
    6. 11.6 Testing the sample application
  18. Chapter 12. IBM Worklight for CICS
    1. 12.1 Creating a Worklight adapter
    2. 12.2 Testing the Worklight adapter
    3. 12.3 Calling the Worklight adapter from the Worklight client code
  19. Part 4 Appendix
  20. Appendix A. Sample level for a JSON schema
    1. Sample JSON schema generated from COBOL customer create program
  21. Appendix B. Sample COBOL programs
    1. Sample programs for CICS as a client for JSON web services
  22. Appendix C. Additional material
    1. Locating the web material
    2. Using the web material
  23. Related publications
    1. IBM Redbooks publications
    2. How to get IBM Redbooks publications
    3. Help from IBM
  24. Back cover

Product information

  • Title: Implementing IBM CICS JSON Web Services for Mobile Applications
  • Author(s): Rufus Credle, Andy Armstrong, Chris Atkinson, Russell Bonner, Geoff Pirie, Inderpal Singh, Nigel Williams, Matthew Wilson, Mark Woolley
  • Release date: November 2013
  • Publisher(s): IBM Redbooks
  • ISBN: 9780738438900