The workbench
The workbench is a single window that consists of views and perspectives.
- Views
- A view is a visual component in the workbench that displays related information about the CICSplex. For example, the Tasks view displays information about all the CICS® tasks in the CICSplex or a single CICS region in the CICSplex. You can add, delete, move, and size views in the workbench.
- Perspectives
A perspective is a layout of one or more views in the workbench. CICS Explorer® includes the following perspectives: CICS Cloud, CICS SM, Resource, SM Administration, and z/OS. For more information about the perspectives, see the related links later in this topic.
The first time CICS Explorer is started, the Welcome view is displayed. Click the Go to Explorer icon
to minimize the Welcome view and display the default CICS SM perspective. To open a different perspective, click the Open Perspective icon
on the workbench toolbar and click the required perspective. To restore the Welcome view, clicking on the main menu for the workbench.
You can change the layout of the views in a perspective, but you can always restore the perspective to the last saved configuration by clicking
on the main menu for the workbench.
The following screen capture shows an example of the workbench, with the shortcut bar displayed in the workbench toolbar. The name of the active perspective, CICS SM, is displayed in the shortcut bar. You can use the icons in the shortcut bar to open new perspectives and switch between perspectives that are already open.

- Status bar
- The status bar displays status messages, error messages, or short
descriptions of attributes, depending on the current action.
- Connection status bar
- The connection status bar displays information about the system
connection:
- The connection icon indicates the state of the connection. See Workbench icons for further information.
- A menu icon provides access to a menu of all defined connections. To activate a connection, click the required connection name on the menu.
- The name of the current connection is displayed. For a full description of the connection, hover over the name. To edit details of the connection, click the name and use the resulting window.