CA Mainframe Software Manager (CA MSM) enhances installation and maintenance for CA's line of mainframe-based software products. The offering is freely available to any license holder of any CA product for z/OS.

• CA MSM reduces the time needed to install new products and updates, compared with IBM's System Modification Program/Extended (SMP/E).
• The automation provided by CA MSM reduces errors that could occur in the traditional SMP/E approach.
• New support staff can become productive with CA MSM in a few hours, while SMP/E training takes months of study and experience to achieve similar accuracy.
• CA MSM automates the handling of updates from the Internet, eliminating the need for customers to process physical tapes.
• CA MSM's usability can benefit CA in mainframe competitive evaluations, increasing its market share in the z/OS domain.

• Where possible, use CA MSM for CA product installation and maintenance.
• Ask other z/OS domain software vendors whether they intend to support the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS) Solution Deployment Descriptor (SDD) guidelines.

Use CA MSM where possible for CA product installation and maintenance.

Mainframe software maintenance using IBM's SMP/E is complex, time-consuming and error-prone. SMP/E has changed little since its introduction in the late 1970s. The interface is batch-like, with traits of the green screen and the 80-column card in its layout. The commands are syntactically unforgiving, with no online guide, interactive help or tutorial for the inexperienced user. As a result, modifying the z/OS environment is complex, time-consuming and error-prone. Customers facing maintenance workloads rely on highly trained specialists to research the inputs to SMP/E and craft the appropriate code sequence. An incorrect update will usually result in a nonfunctional image (which can be quickly rolled back) or, worse, a poorly functioning image (which may run for a time before the defects become apparent).

Training on SMP/E is arduous, so new employees shy away from it, while the skill pool of experienced SMP/E systems programmers is shrinking. There is no clear career path for a highly skilled SMP/E technical specialist, so management faces difficulty recruiting new talent into that particular role. In contrast, most other platforms offer a more-user-friendly experience, such as the Windows installer engine. Most users are familiar with that capability, and it is quite user-friendly.

CA MSM provides an intuitive, "Windows-like" front end to SMP/E. This capability provides a radically simplified graphical front end that creates and executes classical SMP/E statements. CA MSM became generally available in July 2009. It is free to any CA mainframe customer that is paying maintenance for a z/OS environment mainframe product. It will install any z/OS product that conforms to SMP/E packaging rules, as defined in the SMP/E Packaging Guidelines in IBM publication SC23-0221-02.

CA MSM is not proprietary, in that it can work with software packages that comply with OASIS SDD packaging guidelines. CA is using CA MSM to manage the installation of more than 70 of its z/OS support products. CA intends to enable more than 120 of its z/OS software products for CA MSM by the end of May 2010.

One CA MSM user is a large, diversified financial services firm in the Midwest region of the U.S. It runs CA MSM to support all of its CA products in the z/OS environment, except CA Panvalet, which, as of the time of this discussion, had not yet been brought under CA MSM management. Without CA MSM, customers would spend hours or days researching an update to a CA product, then verifying the existence of appropriate corequisite and prerequisite products, features and service. This would be followed by hours of careful execution of multiple, discrete process steps, with extensive analysis and detailed verification required for each. With CA MSM, the process takes just an hour or two. The client noted that it no longer had to spend time and space managing physical tapes, because CA MSM manages the downloading and archiving of updates to the CA products from the Internet.

A second CA MSM user is a state agency, also in the U.S. Midwest. It began by using CA MSM to update CA MSM itself. The agency installed the initial release, and used it to apply current updates to CA MSM successfully. It has used CA MSM more than a dozen times, saving at least one hour per installation. In some cases, CA MSM cuts the time for maintenance and installation from a day or more to an hour or less. Simply put, the CA MSM tool eliminates one complex, error-prone and time-consuming element of z/OS system management.

CA MSM also manages Hold Data, which indicates whether a program temporary fix (PTF) is in error. The agency has two engineers cross-trained on SMP/E, which is becoming a challenge as its current staff approaches retirement age. The agency noted that people who use CA MSM still need to understand their SMP/E data set library names and configuration. If the data set definitions are not specified to CA MSM, it will create default DD definitions for you.

CA is reaching out to other mainframe software vendors to take advantage of this capability. We expect these firms to use CA MSM to update the front end to their installation and maintenance of their products to exploit this graphical metaphor. SMP/E will remain, and CA MSM coexists with it comfortably, so it's likely that many independent software vendors (ISVs) will adopt CA MSM. CA has invested significant resources in this product. Although adoption by others would be beneficial, it remains possible that other ISVs will develop their own alternatives, or it will remain unchanged. This would represent a potential loss for CA in its attempt to revitalize the mainframe environment.

CA could introduce proprietary extensions for its installation procedures, violating OASIS SDD guidelines. However, that would risk alienating ISVs that agreed to provide packaging that was CA MSM-compatible. It is also possible that IBM could introduce extensions to SMP/E that could functionally supersede CA MSM.

Experienced z/OS system programmers may lament the passing of SMP/E, but not for long. Customers will be pleased by the simplicity of installing CA's technology. This may give CA a competitive advantage in proof-of-concept trials involving mainframe products. Other z/OS-environment software vendors may find this tool compelling. Installations using traditional SMP/E, or requiring entirely manual installation processes, will appear antiquated, now that there is a more contemporary alternative.

CA's strategy for CA MSM is to enhance the installation and maintenance experience for CA's line of mainframe-based software products. However, by embracing OASIS SDD, CA leaves the door open for other software vendors to align their software products with CA MSM.

CA MSM offers an enhanced human interface to SMP/E, and performs much of the housekeeping tasks associated with mainframe-environment product installation and maintenance.

CA faces a challenge in gaining market acceptance from the traditional mainframe audience for this new interface. Moreover, the extent of CA's success with CA MSM will be determined by other mainframe software vendors' support for OASIS SDD. Without the support of other vendors, CA MSM will remain a CA-centric tool for the installation and management of CA mainframe software.

The only alternative is IBM's SMP/E, which is complex, hard-to-learn and difficult to use. However, because CA MSM uses the openly available OASIS SDD standard, other mainframe-oriented vendors could deliver competitive tools that support CA software products.

Customers with investments in CA mainframe-oriented software products should consider CA MSM as a useful tool for the installation and maintenance of CA software products.

CA MSM cannot support products that are not compliant with OASIS SDD. Customers with minimal investments in CA mainframe-oriented software products or other mainframe-oriented software products should continue to use IBM's SMP/E tool, and continue to watch competitors for emerging alternatives, whether from IBM or other ISVs.