General enhancements to CICS Web support

Enhancements to CICS® Web support include improved capability for processing HTTP requests and responses when CICS is an HTTP server, improvements to the way CICS Web support handles code page conversion, and better support for HTTP time and date formats.

Improved support for processing HTTP requests and responses

The URIMAP definition is a new CICS resource which provides an improved and more powerful facility for processing HTTP requests and responses when CICS is an HTTP server. The new URIMAP resource definition means that:
  • As well as providing dynamic responses to a Web client using an application program, you can provide static responses using content from an HFS file or CICS document template.
  • You can handle HTTP requests with greater transparency.
  • You can carry out online administration for HTTP requests.
  • The use of an analyzer program to handle HTTP requests is optional.

CICS API support for analyzing HTTP requests and responses is extended. The EXEC CICS WEB EXTRACT command is enhanced to extract more information from requests, and the new EXEC CICS WEB PARSE URL command enables you to analyze any URL and extract information for reuse.

The EXEC CICS WEB SEND and WEB RECEIVE commands used by CICS as an HTTP server are enhanced to give you more control and capability when receiving requests from a Web client and sending responses. For example, you can now use a buffer of data to provide the message body for a response (as an alternative to using a CICS document), and you can specify options to determine when the response is sent and whether CICS should signal the client to end its connection after receiving the response. The changes to these commands are described in CICS Web support upgrade to HTTP/1.1.

Improved support for code pages

The code page conversion for CICS Web support is improved, and you no longer need to set up a code page conversion table (DFHCNV) for use with CICS Web support.

The UTF-8 and UTF-16 character encodings are now available for code page conversion in CICS.

Support for HTTP time and date format

A new CICS API command, CONVERTTIME, converts common date and time stamp formats used on the Internet into the CICS ABSTIME format. Options are added to the EXEC CICS FORMATTIME command to convert the ABSTIME format into a date and time stamp string that is suitable for use on the Internet.