Validating JDBC Connection to iSeries

[TitanRebel <TitanRebel@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Is there a "standard" way to validate that a JDBC connection to the 
iSeries is
still valid?  I've implemented my own connection pooling and I thought 
that I
had been validating the connections by doing  "conn.getMetaData()". 
Evidently,
this method does not "make a trip" to the iSeries.  Is there anything other
than "querying a file that will always be there".  It just doesn't seem 
to be
an elegant solution, but if this is the only way then so be it.

I'm testing this by:
1. Creating and testing some valid connections to the database in the pool
(running Tomcat on my PC).
2. Disable my network connection via Win2k.
3. Try it again, getting an error of course.
4. Re-enable my network connection.
5. Try it again.  This is where my connection pool should determine that the
existing connections in the pool are invalid, and re-establish a new
connection returning the new one.


Thanks,

Ken K.