iSeries

Lecture 2

iSeries architecture

Several architectural features of the iSeries Architecture distinguish the system from other machines in industry, including UNIX and Windows NT. These features [“the five sacred architectural principles”] include:

• Technology Independence [ due to the two-part operating system and TIMI]

• Object-based design • Hardware integration

• Software integration • Single level store

iSeries architecture

Several architectural features of the iSeries Architecture distinguish the system from other machines in industry, including UNIX and Windows NT. These features [“the five sacred architectural principles”] include:

• Two-part operating system

• Technology-independent machine interface (TIMI)

• Object-based system • Single-level storage

• Separate I/O processors • Multiple data busses

• High degree of integration

• Open Standards

• Logical partitions and many operating systems

iSeries 800 to 890

Two-part operating system

• There are two components to the operating system software on an iSeries server. unique in the industry. The two components are – System Licensed Internal Code (SLIC) and – Operating System/400 (OS/400).

• SLIC provides the TIMI with – process control– resource management– integrated SQL database– Security– Communications– file system– temp storage– JVM, and other primitives.

• SLIC is a layer of software at the lowest level, much like a Unix kernel, only far more functional.

Two-part operating system (cont.)

• Operating System/400 (OS/400).

– Provides the functions that present and work with these services to the user and to applications.

– OS/400 also provides a vast range of high-level language (such as C/C++, COBOL, RPG, FORTRAN) runtime functions.

– OS/400 interacts with the client-server graphical user interface [iSeries Navigator].

Technology-Independent Machine Interface

SLIC, is the Optimizing Translator converts applications to the proper instruction set for the processor. After translation, which is much like the last part of a compile process, the resultant code is maintained with the program object, for reuse.

Two-part operating system (cont.)

• In iSeries changes to processor hardware and firmware do not affect the– operating system– middleware or – business applications.

• The heart of this ability to change without disrupting customers and their applications is– the Technology-Independent Machine Interface (TIMI).

• Applications do not have to rewritten or even recompiled to exploit new hardware technologies.

• This permits only iSeries servers to make technology advances in the hardware, such as storage, memory, and processor technology, while protecting end-users' investments in existing applications

Two-part operating system (cont.)

• All iSeries models • smallest a few hundred users• Largest hundreds of thousands of users

– share the same software architecture, including the TIMI.

– This permits applications to scale across the entire product line, from the smallest to the largest models.

• 48-bit [CISC] 64-bit [RISC]• Digital Equipment case !! 32 – 64• 128-bit ?

Object-based system

• OS/400 keeps all information as objects.

• All program and operating system information, such as:– user profiles, database files, programs, printer queue etc. has

its associated object type stored with the information.

• In the iSeries architecture, the object type determines how the object can be used (which methods). – For example, it is impossible to corrupt a program object by

modifying its code sequence data, as if it were a file. Because the system knows the object is a program, it will only allow valid program operations (run, backup). Thus, with no write method, iSeries program objects are immune to a true virus.

– Simple stream data files, such as MP3 audio files, are stored as

stream-file objects with familiar open, read, and write operations.

Object-based system

Single-Level Storage

• The iSeries architecture specifies a single very, very large virtual address space known as Single-Level Storage (SLS).

• All objects, programs, files, users, data, working space, database tables... everything, resides in this storage space.

• This storage space is addressed using 128-bit pointers. It is divided into sections, including Temporary and Persistent. This distinction refers to between re-boots. For examples, a user profile is in Persistent, and a shared memory segment is in Temporary.

Single-Level Storage

Separate I/O processors and multiple data busses

• The hardware side of the iSeries architecture emphasizes the use of specialized, intelligent I/O).

• Tasks such as disk, network, tape, and terminal I/O are offloaded to a variety of dedicated processors, allowing the main processor(s) to work on application execution.

• Most of these I/O processors are PowerPC-based high-speed RISC processors running a small, self-contained operating system.

High Degree of Integration

• Another defining characteristic of the iSeries architecture is the high degree of integration both above and below the TIMI. – For example, DB2 for OS/400 is a native relational database management

system. That is, DB2/400 is shipped with every system and highly integrated into the licensed internal code and the operating system.

• The following are areas of iSeries's integration:

• Relational database management system (DB/2 for OS/400) • Transaction monitor • Communications • Security • Internet serving • User and group administration • Printer management • Job (process) management • Backup and recovery • Online help • Electronic customer support • System and network management

Open standards

The iSeries heritage is based on integration emphasis has been on providing an integrated solution.

Although OS/400 is proprietary, IBM has insured an iSeries focus on "open" system

applications. OS/400 provides numerous industry standards which facilitate application portability from other platforms and interoperability with other hardware platforms.

IBM's strategy for implementing POSIX, Single UNIX Specification and XPG4 functions has been to provide APIs and system interfaces that are most valuable to most vendors developing commercial business applications. OS/400 portability support includes:

• Asynchronous signals • BSD sockets • Environment variables • Interprocess communication (IPC) • File Systems • POSIX file system • Process control • TCP/IP • TI-RPC • Multi-threading (both POSIX and Java)

Logical partitions and many operating systems

Logical partitions and many operating systems

iSeries is the universal server. • OS/400• Linux• Unix, • Windowsapplications all run on iSeries servers. A single server may optionally be divided into several partitions, each

of which receives a dedicated set of resources, including processor and memory. 

The primary partition must be OS/400, but the other partitions can run, as of this writing, different versions of OS/400 and Linux. 

Logical partitions and many operating systems (cont.)

• Linux distributions, provided by several vendors, run in logical partition(s) of an iSeries server.

• Windows applications run on an iSeries server on an optional plug-in Intel processor.

• Rather than run an instance of a Unix operating system,

applications from AIX run inside an OS/400 job, completely and seamlessly integrated into OS/400. – This option is the OS/400 Portable Application Solution Environment

(OS/400 PASE). PASE provides a very easy way to drop in, often unmodified, a Unix application on iSeries.

Questions

• Compute-intensive [complex operations on small amount of data]

• Information-intensive [simple operations on a large amount of data]

•

Open standards

The iSeries heritage is based on integration emphasis has been on providing an integrated solution.

Although OS/400 is proprietary, IBM has insured an iSeries focus on "open" system

applications. OS/400 provides numerous industry standards which facilitate application portability from other platforms and interoperability with other hardware platforms.

IBM's strategy for implementing POSIX, Single UNIX Specification and XPG4 functions has been to provide APIs and system interfaces that are most valuable to most vendors developing commercial business applications. OS/400 portability support includes:

• Asynchronous signals • BSD sockets • Environment variables • Interprocess communication (IPC) • File Systems • POSIX file system • Process control • TCP/IP • TI-RPC • Multi-threading (both POSIX and Java)