Example: Migrating and then installing a change package

Suppose that you want to migrate a set of resource definitions from your development CICS® environment (which is CSD-based) to your test CICS environment (where some CICS regions are CSD-based and others are managed by CICSPlex® SM), and then install the migrated resource definitions into the active test CICS regions:

  1. Package the resource definitions in development into a change package.

    Figure 1 shows an example change package, referring to a set of resource definitions in the CSD-based CICS configuration named DEVT.

    Figure 1. Example: installing a change package after migrating (part 1 of 2: the change package before migration)
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    Tip: Typically, before migrating updated resource definitions from your development environment to your test environment, you install them in your active development CICS regions. You do not need a change package to install the resource definitions; you can install each resource definition individually. However, if you add the updated resource definitions to a change package, then, when you have finished editing them all, you can install them together by viewing the list of resource definitions in the change package, and performing an "ad hoc" install action on the entire list. This is different to installing the change package, because it does not involve a migration scheme. For details, see Processing a change package.
  2. Ready the change package.
  3. Migrate the change package using a migration scheme that identifies the development CICS configurations as the source and the test CICS configurations as the target.
  4. Install the change package using the same migration scheme.
    Figure 2. Example: installing a change package after migrating (part 2 of 2: the change package after migration)
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This reuse of the change package for migration and then install is possible because the migration step automatically adds the migrated resource definitions (in the target CICS configurations) to the change package. The install action searches the change package for resource definitions that belong to the target CICS configurations of the migration scheme, and finds the resource definitions that have been added by the migration step.

Figure 2 illustrates the previous example, and highlights the benefits of reusing change packages to perform actions after migration, especially when the migration involves multiple target CICS configurations. In a single step, you can perform an action across multiple CICS regions with the resource definitions that have just been migrated, regardless of whether the regions use CSD files or are managed by CICSPlex SM.