Re: Communications Project -- MIDRANGE-L


Hum,

        I missed something, IP in the link ??, hardware ??, I thought you
were going to make this work with only AS/400 communications support in the
link.  Sounds like you have a PC in a box using IP to talk with the AS/400,
Right !  So you have done what many first suggested here which is put a PC
between GM and the Customer, and use a peer process, APPC, IP, something
other than ASYNC,  to make the final connection.

        I think the toad needs to be well done...

        JMS....  <g>

-----Original Message-----
From: Patrick Townsend <townsend@patownsend.com>
To: MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com <MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com>
Cc: nina jones <ddi@datadesigninc.com>
Date: Thursday, June 24, 1999 8:25 PM
Subject: Re: Communications Project


>
>That sound is toad sizzling on the BBQ...
>
>It took a little longer than five days, but we are up and running now.
>Here's the play-by-play for anyone who's interested:
>
>TUE 6-15: We got the go ahead from Nina to ship her customer
>          the software and hardware today. She is going to be on
>          site on Thursday and will get it installed. The
>          PC technician there wants to load the IP address on
>          the serial interface unit, so we give him
>          instructions on how to do it. We would normally do
>          this before we ship the unit, but he doesn't have
>          an IP address for it and wants to do it himself.
>          It's easy - I'm not expecting any delays because
>          of this. The bets around here are split evenly on
>          my having to eat toad. But I'm confident, what could
>          go wrong?
>
>THU 6-17: The customer gets the software, it gets installed on
>          the AS/400, the hardware gets an IP address, we can
>          ping it from the AS/400. The serial unit gets
>          connected to the DSU/CSU and the link is up to
>          GM. By the end of the day things are looking
>          goooood. I smell victory. I'm starting to gloat.
>          I am not going to have to eat toad. Tomorrow I'm
>          expecting to capture GM Sequencing transactions
>          and wrap it up.
>
>FRI 6-18: Argh... We are getting data from GM but it is
>          garbage. Just strings of binary data. I fiddle
>          with the configuration on the AS/400 thinking
>          the set up isn't right. Calls to the customer
>          to verify the serial connection parameters.
>          The PC technician hooks up a PC and sees garbarge,
>          too! Now I'm sure there is a set up issue on the
>          GM side. More calls to GM. They've got their side
>          set up for EBCDIC data. That's a new one! Weird,
>          but we should be able to handle it. I make changes
>          in our configuration and now we are starting
>          to get some meaningful data, but it is chopped
>          up. We aren't getting complete transactions. Will
>          try again on Monday.
>
>MON 6-21: Fresh, ready to go at this again. We continue
>          to receive partial records. We re-check the
>          serial parameters with GM again. They insist
>          8N1, 19200, Xon/Xoff. More fiddling, calls
>          to our hardware supplier. No answers. Those
>          who bet I would eat toad are smiling again.
>          At the end of the day we decide to ask GM to
>          use ASCII data instead of EBCDIC. My thought
>          is that they might be sending control codes
>          in the data stream that cause problems. We'll
>          go at this again on Tuesday.
>
>TUE 6-22: GM switches to ASCII data. We change our
>          configuration on the AS/400 to match. Restart
>          the environment. We are getting data, but it
>          is still garbage. But it is interesting garbage
>          this time. Hex shows strings like B0B3B6. Hmmm,
>          this looks like ASCII numbers with even parity.
>          Or 7-bit data with a stop bit. Very curious.
>          If you turn the high bit off of the charcters you
>          get 303336. Real numbers! Hope is rekindled. Now I
>          am convinced that the connection is not what
>          we thought. More calls to GM.
>
>WED 6-23: Lost day for us. We get involved in a rescue
>          for another customer. But GM reports that the
>          serial parameters are not what they told us!
>          This is good news! GM changes the interface and
>          we start getting complete transactions in our
>          log. But Nina reports that the data is not going
>          to our inbound data queue. This should be easy
>          to figure out. The rescue is successful, but
>          we lose a day.
>
>THU 6-24: Yes, our C program is not writing the data to
>          the queue correctly. The problem is only in our
>          one-way receive module. Easy fix. Migrate the
>          code and Voila! Complete sequencing transactions
>          arrive in the file. Success! Great sigh of relief
>          at the customer site as they have to pass a
>          test with GM on Saturday. Nina's breathing again,
>          too.
>
>If you start counting on Thursday when the software arrived and got
>installed, it took 6 days to get everything working. One more than the 5
>days I bet. But things are looking good and the customer is happy. We
>all realize that we would have been up and running on Friday if the link
>had been defined correctly. And it's been great working with Nina. Her
>customer is lucky to have her on their team!
>
>What kind of sauce do you put on toad....?
>
>Patrick
>--
>IBM AS/400 communications, FTP automation, and network security
>software and consulting services.
>
>http://www.patownsend.com
>
>Jeffrey Silberberg wrote:
>>
>>     Well, is it done or roast T........
>>
>>         JMS...
>>
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