Host Integration Server Blog : Host Integration Server

New Whitepaper!

hispms — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 19:26:00 GMT

Thanks Charles Ezzell (Escalation Engineer on the Host Integration Server Team) for writing the whitepaper entitled Creating a Self-Running BizTalk Stress Application using the BizTalk Adapter for DB2 which can be found here.

Host Integration Server 2006 Support for IP-DCL to IBM iSeries (AS/400) Systems

hispms — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 03:19:00 GMT

Host Integration Server 2006 can now connect to IBM iSeries Systems using the HPR protocol. This will allow customers to support existing SNA applications in an all TCP/IP network. With the release of IBM OS/400 version 5 release 4, Host Integration Server can now establish a connection to an iSeries system using our IP-DLC link service. On the iSeries system we had to create a Controller Description of Link type *HPRIP and with 'Remote Internet Address' set to the IP address of the Host Integration Server. Our system also had the network attribute 'APPN Node Type' set to *BEXNODE, which is branch network node. This may vary depending on your APPN topology.

Microsoft Host Integration products for 2006 available on Microsoft web site

hispms — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 19:52:00 GMT

Yes, we released these products to manufacturing on 27th October, 2006.

Microsoft Host Integration Server 2006, which is a standalone product that offers key enabling technologies that allow enterprise organizations to integrate their mission-critical host applications, data sources and security systems with new solutions developed using the Microsoft Windows platform. You can download the Microsoft Host Integration Server 2006 Evaluation Edition (120-day) software from Microsoft’s external web site, at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=E4A40127-D73C-4D41-B8B4-FBBE68EEC47E&displaylang=en.

Microsoft BizTalk Adapters for Host Systems, which requires BizTalk Server 2006 and offers efficient development tools and native runtime protocol engines that allow enterprise IT to connect BizTalk to existing line-of-business programs and data on IBM mainframe zSeries and midrange iSeries computers, preserving the integrity and performance of vital line-of-business systems, while extending those investments to new solutions. You can download the Microsoft BizTalk Host Adapters for Host Systems (requires BizTalk Server 2006) from Microsoft’s external web site, at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=C0D4B943-1786-4B74-A9A4-FDAA582F5FA2&displaylang=en.

Visit these web sites in the near future for more information on these new Microsoft products, http://www.microsoft.com/hiserver and http://www.microsoft.com/biztalk.

Final Build for Host Integration Server 2006

hispms — Thu, 26 Oct 2006 01:31:00 GMT

We have hit the final milestone for Host Integration Server 2006. The build is in Final Media validation. What does that mean? We are done with the release. Codenamed "Dawson", Host Integration Server 2006 and BizTalk Adapters for Host Systems has been a two year project. Here are some of some of the new technologies included in this release:

BizTalk Adapters for Host Systems
The BizTalk Adapters for Host Systems include adapters for the Transaction and Data Integration components of Host Integration Server. There are actual adapters for Transaction Integrator, DB2, and Host Files which allow BizTalk to interact with Host Applications easier.
Manged Data Provider Enhancements
The Data Integration space has added a new .NET 2.0 data provider for Host Files which include VSAM, PDS, PDSE, and AS/400 file systems.
Visual Studio Explorer for DB2
The Managed Provider for DB2 was enhancement to support the Visual Studio extensions for Server Explorer. Now, you can browse DB2 information within Visual Studio exactly like you can SQL Server information.
Discriminated Unions
Host developers have always created dynamic redefines in COBOL and RPG overlays. Now, Host Integration Server can import those definitions and using a "discriminate" field can expose that windows applications. Both the Transaction Integrator and Managed Provider for Host Files can use this technology to better integrate with Host Applications.
Session Integrator
Session Integrator is a new technology to Host Integration Server but a very well known one in the industry more commonly called "Screen Scraping". In this release, Session Integrator exposes both .NET 2.0 and COM APIs for developers to integrate with legacy green screen applications.
Native x64 platform support
All of the components of Host Integration Server have been ported to the x64 platform in addition to the x86 platform. In addition, there is limited Side-by-Side support for 32bit applications running x64 platforms.
Visual Studio 2005 support
The entire product is built using the Visual Studio 2005 tool set using all of the new secure APIs and compiler/linker switches. Visual Studio 2005 was a major leap forward in security for code and Host Integration Server has taken advantage of that. In addition all of the managed libraries for Host Integration Server as well as the Host Integration Server Designer were brought up to the Visual Studio 2005 level. Unfortunately, there is no support for Visual Studio 2003 within the Host Integration Server 2006 product.

In addition to these,These are just a few of the many features the team has worked on over the last 2 years that are being delivered in the release. Over the coming weeks, we will be looking at the new technologies in more depth.