July 2012 - iTech Solutions Group › documents › 2012-07.pdf · 2016-10-03 · Everything to Get...

8/7/12 If my IBM i (AS/400) could talk it would ask for iTech Solutions

1/13archive.constantcontact.com/fs040/1101897140933/archive/1110486864683.html

July 2012 iTech Solutions because IBM i (AS/400, iSeries) didn't come

with a System Administrator.

In This Issue

RUNQRY Command

Ports for Firewall

Upcoming Events

Not applied PTFs

Release levels and PTFs

Quick Links

More About Us

Upcoming Events

Quick Links

Register Now

Last Month'sNewsletter

More About Us

CommonConnect Article

on V6R1

Greetings!

i can do anything with iTech Solutions

Go for the Gold. Well perhaps you were thinking I

was talking about the Olympics at the end of this

month but I was talking about selecting the right

business partner. Just like the Olympics the business

partner who trains the hardest, spends the time

improving themselves, and challenging themselves is

going to be the partner that wins your confidence

and work. Not all business partners are the same,

have the same skills, invest in themselves, and can

go the distance. Here at iTech Solutions we are

investing in ourselves, our staff, our infrastructure,

and our customers. This kind of training doesn't just

happen, it's a way of life. If you aren't working with

us, perhaps it's time you give us a call and bring

home the gold yourself.

Let iTech Solutions be part of your team, part of

your IT infrastructure, and part of your extended

staff. Our services and knowledge are second to

none, and we look forward to helping you leverage

your investment in Power Systems and bringing home

the gold for your company. Now back to the



How to make yourTransition to IBM

i 6.1 easier

Olympics, I hope you get some time this summer to

watch and enjoy your favorite summer Olympic

sports. I know that I sure will.

Watch this space in August for some very exciting

news on IBM i hosting, and additional offerings for

running IBM i in the clouds.

This issue of our newsletter has five articles. In the

first article, we will discuss the RUNQRY command.

The second article is about what ports are needed to

be open in your firewall if you want to use IBM i

Access (iSeries Access) from outside the firewall.

The third article lists some of the upcoming events in

which iTech Solutions will be participating. The

fourth article is using the Display PTF Cover letter

command to find unapplied PTFs on your system. The

last article is for your reference with updated PTF

information. Please note that we have added a new

PTF group to our recommended list, which is the

High Availability Group. If you are an iTech Solutions

PTF Maintenance customer, you will receive this on

your next application of PTFs.

If you are still on V5R4, send Pete an email and hecan help you upgrade to 6.1 or 7.1. With moreupgrades than anyone else to 6.1/7.1 done to dateyou know iTech Solutions has the expertise and knowhow.

iTech Solutions can help you improve performance,perform security audits; implement a HighAvailability solution; perform health checks, systemsmanagement, remote administration, PTFmanagement, blade installations, iSCSIconfigurations, backup/recovery; upgrade an existingmachine; or upgrade to a new machine. If you arethinking of LPAR or HMC, then think iTechSolutions. We have the skills to help you get themost out of your IBM i.



For more information on any of the articles below

please visit us at on the web at iTech Solutions

or email iTech Solutions. We would love for you to

let us know any articles that you wish for the future,

or if you enjoy any of the articles in the current

newsletters.

An Oldie but goodie -

RUNQRY.

I was at a customer a few weeks ago helping them

with some data issues they were having, when I

displayed a file on the screen and the customer was

so impressed by the formatting of the data. I said

surely you have used this command before, and they

said they never even saw it. I thought, ok this will

be a good newsletter article command.

Let's start with what exactly is the Run Query

command. This command can run an existing query



or a default query if only a file name is specified.

So, if I want to get a quick simple display of the

contents of a file, with pack fields properly

displayed on my screen, I just enter "RUNQRY *N

filename". Where filename is the actual file name,

or library/filename. If I wanted to look at the

records in the customer master file (called customers

in library QGPL for example) I would just enter

RUNQRY *N QGPL/CUSTOMERS. You can also enter

RUNQRY QRYFILE((QGPL/CUSTOMERS)), but I find the

*N an easier format to use. I would then see

displayed every record in the file, with each field in

its own column. This is a quick and fast way to look

at the contents of a file, with each field being

displayed in its own column.

You can only run this against one file, and there is

the ability to do record selection as well by just

adding the parameter RCDSLT(*YES) and then

another screen is display where you can enter the

selection criteria.

I have used this for many years, and was surprised

that people didn't know this existed.

What

ports do I need open

in my firewall to

use IBM i access

(formerly iSeries

Access or Client Access)?



We were working a few weeks ago with a client who

was trying to use an outside IP address to access

their IBM i (AS/400, iSeries). They were using iSeries

Access from the outside of their firewall, and they

were mapping the external IP address in the firewall

to the NATed (Network Address Translation) internal

address of their IBM i. They couldn't get iSeries

Access to work. Their network guy had opened port

23, but nothing else. Well, iSeries Access uses more

than just port 23 I told them. I gave them the

minimum ports they needed to open, but thought it

would be good to publish a list of ports that are in

use by iSeries Access.

PC

Function

Server

NamePort Non-

SSLPort SSL

Server

Mapperas-svrmap 449 ---

License

Managementas-central 8470 9470

Database

Accessas-database 8471 9471

Data Queues as-dtaq 8472 9472

Network

Drivesas-file 8473 9473

Network

Printersas-netprt 8474 9474

Remote

Commandas-rmtcmd 8475 9475

Signon

Verificationas-signon 8476 9476

Telnet



(PC5250

Emulation)

telnet 23 992

HTTP

Administrationas-admin 2001 2010

POP3 (MAPI) pop3 5010 ---

Management

Centralas-mgtc >

5555

and

5544

5566

Ultimedia

Servicesas-usf 8480 9480

DRDA DRDA 446 ---

DDM DDM 447 448

IBM AnyNet APPCoverTCPIP

397

(TCP

and

UDP)

---

NetServer netbios > 137 ---

NetServer CIFS 445 ---

NetServer netbios > 139 ---

Service Tools

Serveras-sts 3000 ---

RUNRMTCMD REXEC 512 ---

As always, understand the risks and threats that you

open yourself up to when doing this. My preference

is to use a VPN Client to connect to your router, and

then once the tunnel is established you can access

your IBM i.



Upcoming Events.

Some of the events that we will be speaking at, or

exhibiting at are listed below. Don't forget the iTech

Solutions web site at http://www.itechsol.com.

July 20th OCEAN User group www.ocean400.org of

Southern California.

Tips and Tricks to improve performance and

reduce disk space

Everything to Get Started with the new

Systems Navigator for IBM i

What do you need to know when upgrading to

IBM i 6.1 & 7.1.

Building Virtual i partitions hosted by IBM i.

September 18 - Vermont User Group www.vtmug.org

in Essex Junction, VT.

A programmer's future: Looking back to see the

future


IBM i 6.1 & 7.1.

September 19 - The New England Midrange Users

Group www.nemug.com of Rhode Island.

A Programmers future: Looking back to see into

the Future.



September 25 - COMMON Fall Conference in

Columbus, OH. www.common.org

Tips and Tricks to improve performance and

reduce disk space.

Everything to Get Started with the new

Systems Navigator for IBM i

Understanding the HMC, FSP, Firmware, and IBM

i. Putting the pieces together.


IBM i 6.1 & 7.1.

Building Virtual i partitions hosted by IBM i.

December 11 - FASUG CT www.fasug.org

Programmer's future: Looking back to see into

the Future.

Display not applied PTFs.

One of the commands that I find is

always very useful when I am doing our

quarterly PTF maintenance at a

customer is the Display PTF Cover

Letter command, DSPPTFCVR. The

reason is not to just display cover

letters, but I always want to see PTFs

which are not yet applied. By issuing the command,

with the SELECT parameter as *NOTAPY, I then get

to see which PTFs are loaded either as *SAVFs on my

system (that I downloaded using SNDPTFORD), or are

not yet applied. I find this extremely useful when I

want to look at the status of PTFs.



Recently, there were some PTFs for 6.1 that are

required before doing PTFs (Yes, PTFs for the PTF

process), and you must have them on and active

before loading the next cumulative PTF package.

So, after loading all the PTFs from our special image

catalogue of PTFs, I was able to use the DSPPTFCVR

command with SELECT(*NOTAPY) and verify that all

my PTFs had been applied. Now, I knew I could

proceed with the loading the cumulative package of

PTFs.

Another good use for this, is if Service Director is

enabled to download PTFs for you, remember Service

Director will only download and not apply the PTFs

that it determines are hardware critical PTFs. You

can use the DSPPTFCVR command to see if there

exists any PTFs on your system that have been

downloaded and not applied, or even loaded and not

applied.

Release levels and PTFs

People are always asking me how often

they should be performing PTF

maintenance, and when is the right

time to upgrade their operating system. I updated

this article from last month with the current levels of

PTFs. Let's look at PTFs. First, PTFs are Program

Temporary Fixes that are created by IBM to fix a

problem that has occurred or to possibly prevent a

problem from occurring. In addition, some times

PTFs add new functionality, security, or improve

performance. Therefore, I am always dumbfounded



as to why customers do not perform PTF

maintenance on their machine at least quarterly. If

IBM has come out with a fix for your disk drives, why

do you want to wait for your disk drive to fail with

that problem, only to be told that there is a fix for

that problem, and if you had applied the PTF

beforehand, you would have averted the problem.

Therefore, I think a quarterly PTF maintenance

strategy is a smart move. Many of our customers are

on our quarterly PTF maintenance program, and that

provides them with the peace of mind of knowing

their system is up to date on PTFs. Below is a table

of the major group PTFs for the last few releases.

This is what we are installing for our customers on

iTech Solutions Quarterly Maintenance program.

Releases

7.1 6.1 V5R4 V5R3

Cumul. Pack 12115 12122 12094 8267

Tech. Refresh 4

Grp Hipers 62 122 179 169

DB Group 14 26 33 24

Java Group 8 19 29 23

Print Group 5 24 46 20

Backup/Recov. 15 28 45 33

Blade/IXA/IXS 10 24 15 -

HTTP 13 25 31 17

TCP/IP 6 14 21 16

Security 19 32 27



High Availability 1 1

Hardware 1 1

The easiest way to check your levels is to issue the

command WRKPTFGRP. They should all have a

status of installed, and you should be up to the

latest for all the above, based upon your release.

Now there are more groups than the ones listed

above, but these are the general ones that most

people require. We can help you know which group

PTFs you should be installing on your machine based

upon your licensed programs. Here is a nice tidbit.

The Cumulative PTF package number is broken down

as YDDD, where Y is the year and DDD is the day it

was released. Therefore, if we look at the

cumulative package for V5R4, the ID is 9104. We can

determine that it was created on the 104th day of

2009, which is April 14, 2009. Look at your machine

and this will give you a quick indication of just how

far out of date in PTFs you may be. I left V5R1 &

V5R2 off the list, because if you are on V5R1 or V5R2,

you don't need to be worrying about PTFs, you really

need to be upgrading your operating system. The

same can be said for V5R3, but there are still

customers who are on those releases.

If you have an HMC, you should be running V7R7.5

with efix MH01312. If your HMC is a C03, then it

should stay at V7R3.5 SP4.

For your Flexible Service Processor (FSP) that is

inside your Power 5 or Power5+ (520, 515, 525, 550,

570), the code level of the FSP should be

01_SF240_417. Power 6 (940x M15, M25, & M50

machines, and 8203-E4A & 8204-E4A) customers

should be running EL350_126. For Power6 (MMA,



560, and 570 machines) your FSP should be

at EM350_126. If you have a Power6 595 (9119) then

you should be on EH350_126.

Depending on which POWER7 model & generation (B

or C). The firmware level is AL730_087 for 8202-E4B

& 8205-E6B (710, 720, 730, 740), AL730_087 for 750

(8233-E8B) & 755 (8236-E8C). Use AM730_087 for 770

(9117-MMB) & 780 (9179-MHB). The firmware level is

AL740-088 for 8202-E4C & 8205-E6C (710, 720, 730,

740). Use AM740_088 for 770 (9117-MMC) & 780

(9179-MHC).

If you need help with upgrading your HMC or FSP just

give us a call. We will be happy to perform the

function for you or assist you in doing it. Contact

Pete Massiello.

We have the skills to help you get the most out of

your IBM i. For more information on any of the

articles please contact us at [email protected] . We

would also like to know what you think of this

newsletter and any items you would like us to

discuss in future issues.

Our staff of Certified i5/OS professionals can help

you get more out of your machines. Remember,

i want everything to work.

i want control.

i want an i

i need iTech Solutions.

Sincerely,

Pete Massiello

iTech Solutions



www.itechsol.com

July 2012 - iTech Solutions Group › documents › 2012-07.pdf · 2016-10-03 · Everything to Get...

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Transcript of July 2012 - iTech Solutions Group › documents › 2012-07.pdf · 2016-10-03 · Everything to Get...