ALCS transaction monitor
Encyclopedia
ALCS, which stands for Airline Control System, is an application server that provides industrial-strength, online transaction management for mission-critical applications.
ALCS is a transaction processing monitor for the IBM
System/360, System/370, ESA/390, and zSeries
mainframes. It is a variant of TPF
specially designed to provide all the benefits of TPF (very high speed, high volume, and high availability in transaction processing) but with the advantages such as easier integration into the data center offered by running on a standard IBM operating system platform.
Like TPF, it is primarily used in the airline, hotel, and finance industries.
Whereas TPF runs as a stand-alone OS, ALCS is designed to run as an application on top of MVS
/OS/390
/z/OS
. However, the API it provides to applications is very similar to that on TPF
, so applications written for TPF can run on ALCS with minimal modifications: typically fewer modifications than are required to move from one release of TPF to another. ALCS 2.3.1 runs on OS/390
2.10 and z/OS
. ALCS 2.4.1 was released in June 2008.
Because it runs under standard IBM operating systems, it can easily leverage other developments or enhancements on those platforms. For example, to enable MQSeries for TPF required the porting, modification, and authoring of large volumes of code. To enable this on ALCS, only an interface to the MQ product on z/OS needed to be written. And any enhancements made to MQ Series on z/OS by the MQ team are available without any additional work on the part of the ALCS development team. This also applies to TCP/IP, DB2
, VTAM
, to a certain extent language support and even basic disk I/O.
ALCS is a transaction processing monitor for the IBM
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...
System/360, System/370, ESA/390, and zSeries
ZSeries
IBM System z, or earlier IBM eServer zSeries, is a brand name designated by IBM to all its mainframe computers.In 2000, IBM rebranded the existing System/390 to IBM eServer zSeries with the e depicted in IBM's red trademarked symbol, but because no specific machine names were changed for...
mainframes. It is a variant of TPF
Transaction Processing Facility
TPF is an IBM real-time operating system for mainframes descended from the IBM System/360 family, including zSeries and System z9. The name is an initialism for Transaction Processing Facility....
specially designed to provide all the benefits of TPF (very high speed, high volume, and high availability in transaction processing) but with the advantages such as easier integration into the data center offered by running on a standard IBM operating system platform.
Like TPF, it is primarily used in the airline, hotel, and finance industries.
Whereas TPF runs as a stand-alone OS, ALCS is designed to run as an application on top of MVS
MVS
Multiple Virtual Storage, more commonly called MVS, was the most commonly used operating system on the System/370 and System/390 IBM mainframe computers...
/OS/390
OS/390
OS/390 is an IBM operating system for the System/390 IBM mainframe computers.OS/390 was introduced in late 1995 in an effort, led by the late Randy Stelman, to simplify the packaging and ordering for the key, entitled elements needed to complete a fully functional MVS operating system package...
/z/OS
Z/OS
z/OS is a 64-bit operating system for mainframe computers, produced by IBM. It derives from and is the successor to OS/390, which in turn followed a string of MVS versions.Starting with earliest:*OS/VS2 Release 2 through Release 3.8...
. However, the API it provides to applications is very similar to that on TPF
Transaction Processing Facility
TPF is an IBM real-time operating system for mainframes descended from the IBM System/360 family, including zSeries and System z9. The name is an initialism for Transaction Processing Facility....
, so applications written for TPF can run on ALCS with minimal modifications: typically fewer modifications than are required to move from one release of TPF to another. ALCS 2.3.1 runs on OS/390
OS/390
OS/390 is an IBM operating system for the System/390 IBM mainframe computers.OS/390 was introduced in late 1995 in an effort, led by the late Randy Stelman, to simplify the packaging and ordering for the key, entitled elements needed to complete a fully functional MVS operating system package...
2.10 and z/OS
Z/OS
z/OS is a 64-bit operating system for mainframe computers, produced by IBM. It derives from and is the successor to OS/390, which in turn followed a string of MVS versions.Starting with earliest:*OS/VS2 Release 2 through Release 3.8...
. ALCS 2.4.1 was released in June 2008.
Because it runs under standard IBM operating systems, it can easily leverage other developments or enhancements on those platforms. For example, to enable MQSeries for TPF required the porting, modification, and authoring of large volumes of code. To enable this on ALCS, only an interface to the MQ product on z/OS needed to be written. And any enhancements made to MQ Series on z/OS by the MQ team are available without any additional work on the part of the ALCS development team. This also applies to TCP/IP, DB2
IBM DB2
The IBM DB2 Enterprise Server Edition is a relational model database server developed by IBM. It primarily runs on Unix , Linux, IBM i , z/OS and Windows servers. DB2 also powers the different IBM InfoSphere Warehouse editions...
, VTAM
VTAM
Virtual Telecommunications Access Method is IBM's software package that provides communications via telecommunication devices for mainframe environments. It is the implementation of Systems Network Architecture for mainframes...
, to a certain extent language support and even basic disk I/O.