If you have used Host Integration Server 2006 and earlier, you have likely seen HIS display certain error messages in popup message dialogs. For example, a popup message dialog like the following is displayed on a HIS Client when the SnaBase process is unable to connect to a sponsor server:

Host Integration Server – ERROR # 1003

SnaBase could not open a sponsor connection to server servername

OK

When HIS 2009 is installed on either Windows Vista or Windows Server 2008, the HIS popup message dialogs will not be displayed. The reason the popup messages will not be displayed in due to the Session 0 Isolation feature that was introduced in Windows Vista. This feature was added to improve security. If you would like additional details about Session 0 Isolation and its potential impacts, the following are good starting points:

Impact of Session 0 Isolation on Services and Drivers in Windows Vista

Application Compatibility: Session 0 Isolation

Instead of the HIS popup message dialog, HIS 2009 logs an Event 1042 message that contains the information that the HIS popup error dialog would have displayed. The following is an Event 1042 message that is logged when the SnaBase process fails to connect to a sponsor server:

Event ID: 1042
Source: SNA Base Service
Description:
Application returned Error: SnaBase could not open a sponsor connection to server servername

The Event 1042 is a new event message that has been added to HIS 2009.

You will also see that the new Event 1042 message is logged when HIS 2009 is installed on earlier versions o f Windows (e.g. Windows XP) that allow the HIS popup message dialogs to be displayed. In these scenarios, you will get the HIS popup message dialog and the Event 1042 message.

You may also see an event similar to the following logged when HIS 2009 is unable to display the popup message dialog on Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008:

Event ID: 589
Source: SNA Base Service
Description:
Failed to display a pop-up, rc = 0

EXPLANATION
A CreateProcess call for the pop-up process failed. The return code is shown.

The Event 589 is logged in addition to the Event 1042 message.

For those interesting in getting more details about the Host Integration Server Client, the “Understanding the Host Integration Server Client” white paper is now available at the following location:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=fafcf170-ad84-4f80-84b7-97e351e761dd

It should be posted to MSDN as well later this month or early next month.

This white paper discusses the Microsoft® Host Integration Server (HIS) Client. Topics include the installation and configuration of the HIS Client as well as details around some of the underlying HIS client/server architecture and how HIS resources are located by the HIS Client. In addition, some guidance is given around best practices for the HIS Client.

This is hopefully just the first of several HIS Operations/Best Practices white papers that I will be working on.

Please provide any feedback that you have about this one as we can update it in future versions to incorporate new feedback and topics.

For those of you running Host Integration Server 2006, you might be interested in knowing that HIS 2006 SP1 is available for download at the following location:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=c0cc5e8d-fc47-41ac-bcad-67832249eb41

Host Integration Server 2006 Service Pack 1 provides the latest updates for Microsoft Host Integration Server 2006 and Microsoft BizTalk Adapters for Host Systems. It includes customer requested hotfixes and design change requests that improve the quality, reliability and supportability of Host Integration Server 2006 and BizTalk Adapters for Host Systems. The following Knowledge Base article describes the list of fixes included in the service pack:

KB 979238 – A list of the bugs that are fixed in Host Integration Server 2006 Service Pack 1 – http://support.microsoft.com/kb/979238

I recently wrote a couple of Knowledge Base articles that are intended to explain why an HIS Server logs one of the following event messages:

- Event ID: 23

- Event ID: 230

These are very common errors that occur when using HIS Server especially if you still use the 802.2 DLC link service to connect to IBM host systems via the DLC protocol.

The articles also contain troubleshooting steps that can help you capture diagnostics information that the HIS Support Team requires when working on these types of problems. You may also be able to use the diagnostics to determine the root cause of the problem to resolve it without needing to call support.

2824716    Troubleshooting Host Integration Server Event 23 Warnings
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2824716/EN-US

2834567    Troubleshooting Host Integration Server Event 230 Warnings
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2834567/EN-US

I hope the information in these articles is helpful.

Thanks…

Based on feedback from both internal and external sources regarding questions about what the latest updates (fixes) are for both Host Integration Server and the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 (which is included SQL Server Feature Packs), I created a page that lists the current updates fro these products.

I added the link to the Update Center for Microsoft Host Integration Server and Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 page to the Host Integration Server Developer Center.

The goal is that the page will be updated when we release new Cumulative Updates for HIS and new fixes for the OLE DB Provider for DB2.

Hopefully, this new resource will be useful.

The following table contains various information about several versions of the DB2 Providers included with Host Integration Server (HIS) as well as the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 (DB2OLEDB) included in SQL Server Feature Packs.

As a side note for those that might not be aware, the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 included with SQL Server Feature Packs is based on the OLE DB Provider for DB2 that is included with Host Integration Server.

Here is an explanation of the information in each column of the table:

• Product– The product for which the rest of the row information applies to. For example, DB2OLEDBv1 is the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 V1.0 that was included in the SQL Server 2005 Feature Pack.
• File Version– This indicates the released file version of the DB2 Provider. If you were to install the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 V5.0 (DB2OLEDBv5) from the SQL Server 2014 Feature Pack, you would find that the file version of msdrda.dll is 9.0.2148.0.
• Supported for fixes?– This information indicates if the specific version is still in Mainstream support, which means that new fixes can still be provided for that version. “No” indicates that new fixes cannot be provided for that version. If the column contains a date, that is the date that the product transitions from Mainstream Support to Extended Support at which time new fixes will no longer be done.
• Dependent Product’s Lifecycle– This column lists product to which the DB2 Provider version’s lifecycle is associated with. This is pretty obvious for the DB2 Providers included with HIS because the HIS lifecycle applies. For the SQL Server Feature Provider versions, the lifecycle is associated with the lifecycle of the specific SQL Server version that that DB2 Provider was included with. The links take you to the product’s lifecycle information on http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle.
• DB2 for z/OS (Mainframe)– The versions of IBM DB2 for z/OS supported by this version of the DB2 Provider.
• DB2 for iSeries (AS/400) - The versions of IBM DB2 for iSeries (AS/400) supported by this version of the DB2 Provider.
• DB2 for LUW (Linux, Unix, Windows) - The versions of IBM DB2 for LUW supported by this version of the DB2 Provider.

* The DB2 Providers included with HIS 2010 were not supported for use with IBM DB2 for z/OS V10 or IBM DB2 for iSeries V7R1 when HIS 2010 was released. Support for these two DB2 versions was added later. We recommend that you have the current HIS 2010 Cumulative Update (CU) applied when integrating with these DB2 versions. As of June 2014, the current HIS 2010 CU is CU9.

You can refer to the Update Center for Microsoft Host Integration Server and Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 to see the latest updates for HIS and the DB2OLEDB providers.

In addition, please refer to the Microsoft Support Lifecycle site for details on the various lifecycle stages.

The Host Integration Server Product Team has just released the seventh and final Cumulative Update (CU) for HIS 2009. The cumulative update model is used to package and release product fixes on a more consistent schedule.

HIS 2009 CU7 includes all released fixes for HIS 2009, including all the fixes included in the six previous HIS 2009 cumulative updates. HIS 2009 CU7 includes nine new fixes. Details on the included fixes can be found in the following Knowledge Base article:

2975320 Cumulative Update 7 for Host Integration Server 2009

You can download HIS 2009 CU7 via the Hotfix Download Available link in the KB article. You would need to download the CU7 package that matches the HIS 2009 version (x86 or x64) that you have installed.

As noted above, this is the final Cumulative Update for HIS 2009 because HIS 2009 moved to Extended Support as of July 8, 2014. Please refer to the HIS 2009 lifecycle page for details.

The Host Integration Server Product Team has just released the sixth Cumulative Update (CU) for HIS 2009. The cumulative update model is used to package and release product fixes on a more consistent schedule.

HIS 2009 CU6 includes all released fixes for HIS 2009, including all the fixes included in the five previous HIS 2009 cumulative updates. HIS 2009 CU6 includes four new fixes. Details on the included fixes can be found in the following Knowledge Base article:

2851596 Cumulative Update 6 for Host Integration Server 2009

You can download HIS 2009 CU6 via the Hotfix Download Available link in the KB article. You would need to download the CU6 package that matches the HIS 2009 version (x86 or x64) that you have installed.

Thanks…

The HIS 2013 Software Development Kit (SDK) was not included with HIS 2013 as it has been with all prior releases of Host Integration Server. The HIS 2013 SDK has been packaged as a separate download package. This allows updates to the SDK to be made available before the next release of Host Integration Server.

For those customers that use the Transaction Integrator (TI) feature, you will want to go through the ApplicationIntegrationStarterGuide sample because it provides most of the documentation that is available for the many new features in the HIS 2013 version of TI. This sample is located under the \Microsoft Host Integration Server 2013 SDK v1.0\ApplicationIntegration\WindowsInitiated folder after the SDK is installed.

The following link provides an overview to what new with TI in HIS 2013, but the referenced sample includes more details:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn148363(v=bts.80).aspx#AppIntegration

Thanks…

The Host Integration Server Product Team has just released the ninth Cumulative Update (CU) for HIS 2010.

HIS 2010 CU9 includes fixes for HIS 2010 that were fixed after the release of HIS 2010, including all the fixes that are in the previous HIS 2010 cumulative updates.

HIS 2010 CU9 includes 13 new fixes in addition to all the fixes included in the previous HIS 2010 CUs. The majority of the fixes are in the Network Integration (e.g. SNA Gateway) feature.

Details on the included fixes can be found in the following Knowledge Base article:

2897923 Cumulative Update 9 for Host Integration Server 2010 is available

You can download HIS 2010 CU9 via the Hotfix Download Available link in the referenced KB article. You need to download the CU9 pacakge that matches the HIS 2010 version (x86 or x64) that you have installed.

The Host Integration Server Product Team has just released the first Cumulative Update (CU) for HIS 2013.

HIS 2013 CU1 includes fixes for HIS 2013 that were fixed after the release of HIS 2013, including some fixes that were previously released for HIS 2009 and HIS 2010. HIS 2013 CU1 also includes functional improvements for the new Transaction Integrator Configuration Tool as well as for the Microsoft Service for DRDA PowerShell module.

Details on the included fixes can be found in the following Knowledge Base article:

2908834 Cumulative update package 1 for Host Integration Server 2013

You can download HIS 2013 CU1 via the Hotfix Download Available link in the referenced KB article. You need to download the CU1 package that matches the HIS 2013 version (x86 or x64) that you have installed.

I ran across an error while doing some testing with Session Integrator in a distributed deployment scenario. By “distributed deployment”, I am referring to a deployment where you have a Session Integrator application running on a system that does not host the 3270 or LUA LUs that the application is using to communicate with the mainframe. The LUs are defined on another HIS Server system which is also the system where the Session Integrator Server service is running that the SI application will be using. The following is an example of the 2 server deployment scenario:

Application Server

• HIS 2013 Server
  • Configured with a Role of Secondary Configuration Server or Use Remote SNA Gateway
• Session Integrator application

HIS Server (SNA Gateway)

• HIS 2013 Server
  • Configured with a Role of Primary Configuration Server
    • This HIS 2013 Server doesn’t have to be the Primary Configuration Server if there are other HIS Servers in the HIS Subdomain, but it is for this example.
  • Host connection(s) to the IBM mainframe
  • LUs (either 3270 or LUA, depending on what you use in your environment) that the SI application will use to communicate with the mainframe application.

In this sample deployment, the SI application running on the Application Server uses the Session Integrator Client (SI Proxy) components of the Session Integrator feature to communicate with the Session Integrator Server service that us running on the backend HIS 2013 Server that hosts the LU(s) used to communicate with the mainframe application.

When I setup this type of environment and ran the LU0NET Session Integrator application included in the HIS 2013 SDK, the following error was displayed:

I knew for a fact that the LU that I was trying to connect to was available, so I started into normal troubleshooting to see what might be happening. Since Session Integrator uses DCOM to communicate between the Session Integrator Client and Session Integrator Server components, my first thought was that this might be happening due to a permission issue such as what I described in my Why does Session Integrator log Event ID 6 and Event ID 24 warnings? blog post. It turns out that this was not the cause of the problem. My next step was to enable Session Integrator Client traces via the HIS Trace Utility (histrace.exe) to see what might be happening. After I reproduced the problem with the traces enabled, I took a look at the Session Integrator Client internal (sicint1.atf) trace and I found the following trace statements when the SI Client was trying to connect to the SI Server service:

Try to create server object on SJACKHIS20131

Got handle 1ae66418 from server
Client providing cookie 0xa0a0a0a1

Failed to create session on SJACKHIS20131, hr = 800706ba

The 800706ba return code indicates RPC_S_SERVER_UNAVAILABLE. This indicated to me that the remote server where the SI Server service was running was not listening or not allowing communication over the network protocol/port being used. Therefore, I captured a network trace of the problem using Network Monitor to see what was happening on the network. What I found was that the Application Server was sending a TCP/IP Syn request to the remote HIS 2013 Server, but no response was being received. The Syn request was resent two additional times per the default TCP/IP retry behavior and then the connection attempt failed. This resulted in the error being displayed by the SI application.

This behavior led me to looking at the Windows Firewall settings on the two HIS 2013 Server systems.

First, I went to the HIS 2013 Server where the SI Server service was being used. The HIS specific firewall rules were enabled, but HIS doesn’t create a specific rule for the Session Integrator Server service. I decided to manually create an Inbound Rule for SIServer.exe (Session Integrator Server service) to allow TCP traffic over all ports to the HIS 2013 Server system to see if that would correct the problem.

Second, I went to the Application Server to modify the Windows Firewall settings to allow the Firewall to “Display a notification” when the firewall blocks a program from receiving inbound connections as shown here:

I did this just to see if I would see any messages when running the SI application.

After making these changes on the two servers, I ran the SI application again. The firewall on the Application Server displayed a popup message when I ran the SI application (LogonScriptClient.exe in this case) as shown here:

After clicking Allow access, the firewall adds two new inbound rules (one for TCP traffic and one for UDP traffic) for this application.

After enabling the new firewall rules, the SI application was able to connect to the SI Server service and it was able to connect to the mainframe application using the LU that was specified in the SI application configuration.

The summary is that to allow this type of Session Integrator distributed deployment to work, you may need to do the following depending on your firewall settings in your environment:

• Setup a firewall rule for the Session Integrator Server service to allow incoming TCP traffic from Session Integrator Clients that are running SI applications in the network.
• Setup firewall rules for the SI application on the Application Server to allow incoming connections for the application.

If the Session Integrator application and the Session Integrator Server service are running under different user accounts, then you may also need to setup the DCOM permissions as outline in the other blog post I referenced above.

Based on feedback from both internal and external sources regarding questions about what the latest updates (fixes) are for both Host Integration Server and the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 (which is included SQL Server Feature Packs), I created a page that lists the current updates fro these products.

I added the link to the Update Center for Microsoft Host Integration Server and Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 page to the Host Integration Server Developer Center.

The goal is that the page will be updated when we release new Cumulative Updates for HIS and new fixes for the OLE DB Provider for DB2.

Hopefully, this new resource will be useful.

Host Integration Server uses two security groups to implement its security model.  The goal of the security model is to allow the runtime and administrators access to the appropriate HIS resources, but limited to only those resources.  This allows our runtime and administrators to operate as minimum privileged accounts (without the need to have local administrator or act as part of the operating system rights).

HIS Administrators group

This groups grants users the rights to manage and configure Host Integration Server.  The HIS Administrators group has the following rights:

• Rights to start and stop the HIS services
• Read/Write access to the HIS configuration
• Can be granted access to enable HIS traces by the local administrator

HIS Runtime group

This groups grants the HIS service account the rights needed by the Host Integration Server services.  The HIS Runtime group has the following rights:

• Run as a service
• Generate security audits
• Read/Write access to the HIS configuration
• Rights to generate traces

The following table contains various information about several versions of the DB2 Providers included with Host Integration Server (HIS) as well as the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 (DB2OLEDB) included in SQL Server Feature Packs.

As a side note for those that might not be aware, the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 included with SQL Server Feature Packs is based on the OLE DB Provider for DB2 that is included with Host Integration Server.

Here is an explanation of the information in each column of the table:

• Product – The product for which the rest of the row information applies to. For example, DB2OLEDBv1 is the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 V1.0 that was included in the SQL Server 2005 Feature Pack.
• File Version – This indicates the released file version of the DB2 Provider. If you were to install the Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 V5.0 (DB2OLEDBv5) from the SQL Server 2014 Feature Pack, you would find that the file version of msdrda.dll is 9.0.2148.0.
• Supported for fixes? – This information indicates if the specific version is still in Mainstream support, which means that new fixes can still be provided for that version. “No” indicates that new fixes cannot be provided for that version. If the column contains a date, that is the date that the product transitions from Mainstream Support to Extended Support at which time new fixes will no longer be done.
• Dependent Product’s Lifecycle – This column lists product to which the DB2 Provider version’s lifecycle is associated with. This is pretty obvious for the DB2 Providers included with HIS because the HIS lifecycle applies. For the SQL Server Feature Provider versions, the lifecycle is associated with the lifecycle of the specific SQL Server version that that DB2 Provider was included with. The links take you to the product’s lifecycle information on http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle.
• DB2 for z/OS (Mainframe) – The versions of IBM DB2 for z/OS supported by this version of the DB2 Provider.
• DB2 for iSeries (AS/400) – The versions of IBM DB2 for iSeries (AS/400) supported by this version of the DB2 Provider.
• DB2 for LUW (Linux, Unix, Windows) – The versions of IBM DB2 for LUW supported by this version of the DB2 Provider.

* The DB2 Providers included with HIS 2010 were not supported for use with IBM DB2 for z/OS V10 or IBM DB2 for iSeries V7R1 when HIS 2010 was released. Support for these two DB2 versions was added later. We recommend that you have the current HIS 2010 Cumulative Update (CU) applied when integrating with these DB2 versions. As of June 2014, the current HIS 2010 CU is CU9.

You can refer to the Update Center for Microsoft Host Integration Server and Microsoft OLE DB Provider for DB2 to see the latest updates for HIS and the DB2OLEDB providers.

In addition, please refer to the Microsoft Support Lifecycle site for details on the various lifecycle stages.

For any of you running HIS 2009 in your environments, you should be aware that HIS 2009 has entered the Extended Support phase of its lifecycle as of July 8, 2014.

When a product is in Extended Support, it means that Microsoft Support still provides support, but new hotfixes will no longer be created for any new issues that are identified as bugs. In order to get new hotfixes, you would need to purchase an extended support contract.

The HIS 2009 lifecycle is available at http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?p1=14033.

One final Cumulative Update (CU7) will be released for HIS 2009. The exact release date is not finalized, but it is targeted for sometime in August. The CU7 update will include fixes for HIS 2009 that have been done since HIS 2009 CU6.

If you are using HIS 2009, you should start planning on a plan to move a newer version.

Thanks…

The Host Integration Server Product Team has just released the seventh and final Cumulative Update (CU) for HIS 2009. The cumulative update model is used to package and release product fixes on a more consistent schedule.

HIS 2009 CU7 includes all released fixes for HIS 2009, including all the fixes included in the six previous HIS 2009 cumulative updates. HIS 2009 CU7 includes nine new fixes. Details on the included fixes can be found in the following Knowledge Base article:

2975320 Cumulative Update 7 for Host Integration Server 2009

You can download HIS 2009 CU7 via the Hotfix Download Available link in the KB article. You would need to download the CU7 package that matches the HIS 2009 version (x86 or x64) that you have installed.

As noted above, this is the final Cumulative Update for HIS 2009 because HIS 2009 moved to Extended Support as of July 8, 2014. Please refer to the HIS 2009 lifecycle page for details.