Programming Environment

This topic includes the following sections:

• Updating the UBBCONFIG Configuration File

• Setting Environment Variables

• Defining Equivalent Data Types

• Starting and Stopping the Application

 

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Updating the UBBCONFIG Configuration File

The application administrator initially defines the configuration settings for an application in the UBBCONFIG configuration file. To customize your programming environment, you may need to create or update a configuration file.

If you need to create or update a configuration file, refer to the following guidelines:

• Copy and edit a file that already exists. For example, the file ubbshm that comes with the bankapp sample application can provide a good starting point.

• Minimize complexity. For test purposes, set up your application as a shared memory, single-processor system. Use regular operating system files for your data.

• Make sure the IPCKEY parameter in the configuration file does not conflict with any other parameters being used at your installation. Check with your BEA Tuxedo application administrator, and refer to Setting Up a BEA Tuxedo Application for more information.

• Set the UID and GID parameters so that you are the owner of the configuration.

• Review the documentation. The configuration file is described in UBBCONFIG(5) in the File Formats, Data Descriptions, MIBs, and System Processes Reference.

The following table summarizes the UBBCONFIG configuration file parameters that affect the programming environment. Parameters are listed by functional category.

Table 2-1 Programming-related UBBCONFIG Parameters by Functional Category  

Functional Category	Parameter	Section	Description
Global resource limits	MAXSERVERS	RESOURCES	Specifies the maximum number of servers in the configuration. When setting this value, you need to consider the MAX values for all servers.
	MAXSERVICES	RESOURCES	Specifies the maximum total number of services in the configuration.
Data-dependent routing	BUFTYPE	ROUTING	List of types and subtypes of data records for which the specified routing entry is valid.
Link-level encryption	MINENCRYPTBITS	NETWORK	Sets the minimum encryption level that a process accepts.
	MAXENCRYPTBITS	NETWORK	Sets the maximum encryption level that a process accepts.
Load balancing	LDBAL	RESOURCES	Flag for specifying whether or not load balancing is enabled. If enabled, the BEA Tuxedo system attempts to balance requests across the network.
	NETLOAD	MACHINES	Numeric value that is added to the load factor of services that are remote from the invoking client, providing a bias for choosing a local server over a remote server. Load balancing must be enabled (that is, LDBAL must be set to Y).
	LOAD	SERVICES	Relative load factor associated with a service instance. The default is 50.
Security	AUTHSVC	RESOURCES	Specifies the name of an application authentication service that is invoked by the system for each client joining the system.
	SECURITY	RESOURCES	Specifies the type of application security to be enforced.
Conversational communication	MAXCONV	RESOURCES	Sets the maximum number of simultaneous conversations for a single machine. You can specify a value between 0 and 32,767. The default is 64 if any conversational servers are defined in the SERVERS section; otherwise, the default is 1. The specified value can be overriden for each machine in the MACHINES section.
	CONV	SERVERS	Specifies whether or not conversational communication is supported. If this parameter is set to N or unspecified, a TPCONNECT call to a service fails.
	MIN/MAX	SERVERS	Specifies the minimum and maximum number of occurrences of the server to be started by tmboot(1). If not specified, MIN defaults to 1 and MAX defaults to MIN. The same parameters are available for use with request/response servers. However, conversational servers are automatically spawned as needed. So if you set MIN=1 and MAX=10, for example, tmboot starts one server initially. When a TPCONNECT call is made to a service offered by that server, the system starts a second copy of a server. As each copy is called, a new one is spawned, up to a limit of 10.
Transaction management	AUTOTRAN	SERVICES	Controls whether a service routine is placed in transaction mode. If you set this parameter to Y, a transaction in the service subroutine is automatically started whenever a request message is received from another process.
Multithreaded servers	MAXDISPATCHTHREADS	SERVERS	Specifies the maximum number of concurrently dispatched threads that each server process may spawn.
	MINDISPATCHTHREADS	SERVERS	Specifies the number of server dispatch threads started on initial server boot.

The configuration file is an operating system text file. To make it usable by the system, you must execute the tmloadcf(1) command to convert the file to a binary file.

See Also

• Setting Up a BEA Tuxedo Application

• UBBCONFIG(5) in the File Formats, Data Descriptions, MIBs, and System Processes Reference

 

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Setting Environment Variables

Initially, the application administrator sets the variables that define the environment in which your application runs. These environment variables are set by assigning values to the ENVFILE parameter in the MACHINES section of the UBBCONFIG file. (Refer to Setting Up a BEA Tuxedo Application for more information.)

For the client and server routines in your application, you can update existing environment variables or create new ones. The following table summarizes the most commonly used environment variables. The variables are listed by functional category.

Table 2-2 Programming-related Environment Variables

Function	Environment Variable	Defines the . . .	Used by . . .
Global	TUXDIR	Location of the BEA Tuxedo system binary files.	BEA Tuxedo application programs.
Configuration	TUXCONFIG	Location of the BEA Tuxedo configuration file.	BEA Tuxedo application programs.
Compiling	ALTCC1	Command that invokes the COBOL compiler. Default is cobcc.	builclient() -C and buildserver() -C commands.
	ALTCFLAGS1	Link edit flags to be passed to the COBOL compiler. Link edit flags are optional.	builclient() -C and buildserver() -C commands.
	COBOPT	Arguments that you may want to use on the compile command line.	builclient() -C and buildserver() -C commands.
	COBCPY	Directories that contain a set of the COBOL COPY files to be used by the compiler.	builclient() -C and buildserver() -C commands.
Data compression	TMCMPPRFM	Level of compression between 1 and 9.	BEA Tuxedo application programs that perform data compression.
Load balancing	TMNETLOAD	Numeric value that is added to the load value for remote queues, making the remote queues appear to have more work than they actually do. As a result, even if load balancing is enabled, local requests are sent to local queues more often than to remote queues.	BEA Tuxedo application programs that perform load balancing.
Record management	FIELDTBLS or FIELDTBLS32	Comma-separated list of field table filenames for FML and FML32 typed records, respectively. Required only for FML VIEW types.	FML and FML32 record types and FML VIEWs.
	FLDTBLDIR or FLDTBLDIR32	Colon-separated list of directories to be searched for the field table files for FML and FML32, respectively. For Windows 2000, a semicolon-separated list is used.	FML and FML32 record types and FML VIEWs.
	VIEWFILES or VIEWFILES32	Comma-separated list of allowable filenames for VIEW and VIEW32 typed records, respectively.	VIEW and VIEW32 record types.
	VIEWDIR or VIEWDIR32	Colon-separated list of directories to be searched for VIEW and VIEW32 files, respectively. For Windows 2000, a semicolon-separated list is used.	VIEW and VIEW32 record types.

1. On a Windows 2000 system, the ALTCC and ALTCFLAGS environment variables are not applicable and setting them will produce unexpected results. You must compile your application first using a COBOL compiler and then pass the resulting object file to the buildclient or buildserver command.

If operating in a UNIX environment, add $TUXDIR/bin to your environment PATH to ensure that your application can locate the executables for the BEA Tuxedo system commands. For more information on setting up the environment, refer to Setting Up a BEA Tuxedo Application.

See Also

• Setting Up a BEA Tuxedo Application

 

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Defining Equivalent Data Types

The following table lists the C data types for which equivalent COBOL data types are available.

Table 2-3 COBOL Equivalents for C Data Types

C Data Type	Equivalent COBOL Data Type
float	COMP-1
double	COMP-2
long	S9(9) COMP-51
short	S9(4) COMP-51
dec_t	COBOL COMP-3 packed decimal field

1. COMP-5, provided for use with MicroFocus COBOL, allows the COBOL integer fields to match the data format of the corresponding C fields. The data type for VS COBOL II is COMP.

For storage efficiency, COBOL supports packed decimals: two decimal digits packed into each byte with the low-order half byte used to store the sign. The length of a packed decimal may be 1 to 9 bytes with storage available for 1 to 17 digits, including the sign.

The dec_t field is defined in a VIEW. The size is specified as two values separated by a comma. The first value indicates the total number of bytes occupied by the decimal in COBOL. The second value indicates the number of digits to the right of the decimal point in COBOL. You can use the following formula to convert the dec_t field to a COBOL declaration:

dec_t(m, n) => S9(2*m-(n+1),n)COMP-3

For example, a size specification of 6,4 in the VIEW indicates that there are 4 digits to the right of the decimal point and 7 digits to the left, and the last half byte is used to store the sign. A COBOL application programmer represents this as 9(7)V9(4), where the V represents the decimal point between each value. Note that FML does not support the dec_t type; if FML-dependent VIEWs are used, then each field must be mapped to a C type in the VIEW file. For instance, a packed decimal can be mapped to an FML string field, and then the mapping functions can be used to do the conversion between formats.

 

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Starting and Stopping the Application

To start the application, execute the tmboot(1) command. The command gets the IPC resources required by the application, and starts administrative processes and application servers.

To stop the application, execute the tmshutdown(1) command. The command stops the servers and releases the IPC resources used by the application, except any that might be used by the resource manager, such as a database.

See Also

• tmboot(1) and tmshutdown(1) in the BEA Tuxedo Command Reference