Configuring IMS connection factories

Your application interacts with the IMS™ TM resource adapter through an object called the connection factory. IMS connection factories are used to create pre-configured connections to the IMS transaction manger (IMS TM).

When your application uses IMS Connector for Java™, also known as the IMS TM resource adapter, it interacts with IMS through IMS Connect using connections between the IMS TM resource adapter and IMS Connect which are created by an IMS connection factory. These connections can be managed or non-managed. Managed connections refer to connections which are managed by a Connection Manager in a J2EE application server such as WebSphere® Application Server. In a managed environment, applications do not need to create EIS connections themselves. Rather, they request connections from the J2EE Connection Manager. Non-managed connections on the other hand, are obtained directly by applications from the IMS TM resource adapter and are typically used in two-tiered applications.

The type of physical connection between the IMS TM resource adapter and IMS Connect can be one of the following: With either type of connection, your application uses a J2C connection factory to obtain a connection to IMS Connect.

When your application uses managed connections, all connections between the IMS TM resource adapter and IMS Connect are persistent. In other words, a connection is not "opened" and "closed" for each interaction. Instead, it can remain open and can be serially re-used by multiple interactions, providing better utilization of CPU and memory resources. A non-managed connection must be opened and closed by the application which uses it. With managed connections, your J2EE application server administrator configures the connection factory at deployment time, while with non-managed connections, your application must create and configure whatever connection factories it needs at runtime. The use of managed connections and JNDI lookup to get a reference to the appropriate connection factory is recommended.

The IMS TM resource adapter only supports persistent connections to IMS Connect. In a managed environment, persistent connections are serially re-used by application components, without the overhead of disconnecting and reconnecting the connection between each use. When using TCP/IP socket connections, application components can use either dedicated or shareable persistent socket connections between the IMS TM resource adapter and IMS Connect. Shareable persistent socket connections use client IDs that are generated by IMS Connector for Java and are not visible to the application using the shareable socket. Shareable TCP/IP sockets should always be used unless there is some overriding requirement to use dedicated socket connections or Local Option connections. Dedicated persistent socket connections use client IDs that are specified by the application. When using Local Option connections, only shareable persistent connections are supported.
Note: Local Option connections are deprecated.

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