Chapter 25: Advanced CICS Programming -- Further Reading

Books

"CICS: A Practical Guide to System Programming" by Raul Menendez and Doug Lowe The advanced chapters of Menendez and Lowe's guide cover file control, queue management, program control, and interval control with the same clarity as their fundamental chapters. The treatment of browse operations, TS queue patterns for multi-page screen displays, and the LINK/XCTL decision framework is particularly well-presented. The book also addresses channel and container programming as the modern replacement for COMMAREA. Available from Murach and Associates and major technical booksellers.

"CICS: A How-To for COBOL Programmers" by David Shelby Kirk Kirk's book is written from the working COBOL programmer's perspective, with chapters organized around common tasks rather than CICS command categories. The sections on building multi-program transactions with LINK and XCTL, managing temporary storage for browse applications, and implementing security at the application level provide patterns that can be directly applied in production development. Search for this title through technical publishers and major online booksellers.

"Enterprise CICS Application Design" by IBM Press This text focuses on architectural design patterns for large-scale CICS applications, including transaction decomposition strategies, inter-program communication patterns, and the migration from COMMAREA to channels and containers. The discussion of how to design CICS applications for high availability, scalability, and maintainability goes beyond individual command syntax to address system-level concerns. Available from IBM Press and major technical booksellers.

Online Resources

IBM CICS Transaction Server Application Programming Reference The definitive reference for every EXEC CICS command, including all file control, queue, program control, and interval control commands covered in this chapter. Each command entry includes complete syntax, parameter descriptions, exception conditions, and usage notes. This is the essential daily reference for CICS COBOL developers. Search for "CICS Transaction Server Application Programming Reference" on the IBM Documentation website.

IBM CICS Transaction Server Channels and Containers Guide This section of the CICS documentation provides comprehensive coverage of the channel and container programming model, including PUT CONTAINER, GET CONTAINER, MOVE CONTAINER, and DELETE CONTAINER commands. The guide explains the advantages of channels over COMMAREA, data conversion considerations, and patterns for migrating existing COMMAREA-based programs. Available on the IBM Documentation website under CICS Transaction Server publications.

IBM CICS Transaction Server Web Services Guide The web services guide documents how to expose CICS transactions as SOAP and RESTful service providers and consumers. It covers the CICS web services assistant, pipeline configuration, WSDL generation from COBOL data structures, and the runtime processing of inbound and outbound web service requests. Essential reading for integrating mainframe CICS applications with distributed systems. Available on the IBM Documentation website.

IBM CICS Transaction Server Security Guide The security guide covers resource-level security, command-level security, transaction security, and the integration with external security managers (RACF, ACF2, Top Secret). Understanding CICS security is essential for building production applications that meet enterprise security requirements. The guide includes configuration examples and troubleshooting procedures for common security-related abends. Available on the IBM Documentation website.

IBM Documentation

IBM Redbook: "Designing and Programming CICS Applications" This comprehensive Redbook covers the design and implementation of multi-program CICS transactions, including file control patterns, queue-based workflows, and inter-program communication architectures. The worked examples build a complete application from initial design through deployment, demonstrating how the individual CICS commands fit together in a production-quality system. Search for this title on the IBM Redbooks website.

IBM Redbook: "CICS and SOA: Architecture and Integration Approaches" This Redbook addresses the integration of CICS applications with service-oriented architectures, covering web services, RESTful APIs, channels and containers, and modern event-driven architectures. The COBOL examples show how existing CICS programs can be wrapped as services without rewriting, and how new CICS programs can be designed as service components from the start. Search for this title on the IBM Redbooks website.

IBM Redbook: "CICS Performance Guide" The CICS performance guide provides detailed guidance on writing efficient CICS applications, including file control optimization, queue management best practices, and the performance implications of LINK versus XCTL. The sections on temporary storage tuning, file string management, and transaction response time analysis are directly applicable to advanced CICS programming. Search for this title on the IBM Redbooks website.

Standards and Specifications

"CICS Application Modernization Patterns" -- SHARE Conference Proceedings SHARE presentations on CICS modernization cover the migration from COMMAREA to channels, the adoption of RESTful interfaces for CICS transactions, and strategies for decomposing monolithic CICS programs into service-oriented components. These presentations provide practical migration patterns and lessons learned from large-scale modernization projects. Available through the SHARE association website.

"Transaction Processing: Concepts and Techniques" by Jim Gray and Andreas Reuter This foundational text on transaction processing theory is relevant to advanced CICS programming because it explains the principles behind CICS's file control locking, recovery mechanisms, and queue management. Understanding the theoretical foundations helps developers make better design decisions when building complex CICS applications that must handle concurrency, failure, and recovery. Available from Morgan Kaufmann Publishers and major academic booksellers.