The acronym CAICCI stands for Computer Associates International Common Communications Interface. This technical document explains briefly how to configure, manage, and test an important communication component that runs on Unicenter NSM and Unicenter Job Management. It describes how to test CAICCI communication between Windows, UNIX/Linux, HP NonStop, OpenVMS, and a job management manager.
CAICCI Overview
CAICCI is the Common Communications Interface for Unicenter NSM and Unicenter Job Management, and is essentially the glue among the various Enterprise Management components across a heterogeneous environment. CAICCI uses and runs on top of TCP/IP.
CAICCI is implemented as three processes or daemons:
For a Unicenter job manager to communicate with the Unicenter Universal Job Management Agent on a target machine, you need to configure CAICCI on each platform. This doc is discussing step-by-step instructions for configuring CAICCI on the following platforms:
LOCAL and REMOTE Statements
The format is the same for the LOCAL and REMOTE statements. The brackets are applied in the syntax example to separate the parameter names. Otherwise, the parameters are delimited by a space.
LOCAL and REMOTE statements have the following format:
LOCAL = <TCP/IP name> <CCI name> <buffersize> <startup options> <alias options> <port options> <retry interval> REMOTE = <TCP/IP name> <CCI name> <buffersize> <startup options> <alias options> <port options> <heartbeat options> <retry interval>
TCP/IP name
It specifies either an IP address or a name that is used as input to a name service to retrieve an IP address. You may use the TCP/IP name with the PING command to determine whether a remote connection is live. The default is the TCP/IP host name. It does not require a logical connection to the CCI name.
CCI name
Specifies the logical name CAICCI uses to identify this host. This is the system name, which may or may not be the same as the IP hostname. This name may be as long as 64 characters, but an alias must be used for names greater than eight characters.
For the REMOTE statement that defines the mainframe, the CAICCI name is the value specified by SYSID (xxxx) in the //ENFPARMS DD statement. This value is also on the PROTOCOL statement in //ENFPARMS.
Buffersize
Specifies the maximum buffer CAICCI will receive or send over the socket, a value used for segmenting the data transfer. Each side of the connection may have this set to a different value, between 1024 and 32768. The lesser of the two values will be used. It is generally not necessary to alter this field.
Important! Contact CA Customer Support before changing the buffer size.
Startup options
Tells ccirmtd (the CAICCI remote daemon) whether to initiate a connection-sometimes you may want only one side to initiate the connection. Not having the server start connections eliminates a succession of messages when CAICCI is recycled. STARTUP tells CAICCI to attempt a remote connection when activated, whereas NOSTART implies that the remote system will be initiating the connection to the node.
Alias options
Specifies an optional alias name used to differentiate multiple remote computers having exactly the same first eight characters (when their host names exceed eight characters).It specifies that, for hosts with a hostname greater than eight characters, this name is used for internal CAICCI structures. This alias need not appear in DNS or IP host file. It must be unique and consistent across nodes.
When an alias is used on the LOCAL line for a host with a name greater than eight characters, all hosts to which it will be connected must have a REMOTE line for this host with this same alias defined. The format is
ALIAS=aliasname
Port options
It allows you to specify an alternate port for this specific connection only. Sometimes you may have two groups of hosts. One may still use the old 7000 port and the new ones may use the new 1721 port. Any host from the first group wishing to communicate with the second group must be made aware that the connection should be made to a different port. The format is PORT=1721. Do not change this value.
Heartbeat options
It specifies whether the CAICCI remote heartbeat feature is enabled. The heartbeat feature detects connection loss with the remote node if the remote node terminates the connection without notification. The format to enable the heartbeat feature is HEARTBEAT=YES. The format to disable the heartbeat feature is HEARTBEAT=NO.
You can also define the heartbeat functionality by using environment variables as follows.
On Linux or UNIX:
CAI_CCI_RMTHEARTBEAT
When this variable is set to 1, the heartbeat option is enabled to all the nodes listed in the ccirmtd.prf file. However, explicitly setting the option in the ccirmtd.prf file takes precedence over the global flag. The variable needs to be unset to turn it off after being set.
CAI_CCI_HBTIMEOUT
By default, the wait time for an acknowledgement to ping from the remote node is 30 seconds. You can alter this value by setting the variable to a desired number of seconds. The minimum and maximum values allowed are 15 and 45 seconds. The value defaults to 30 seconds if any other value is set.
On Windows:
CAI_CCIRMT_HEARTBEAT
When this variable is set to YES, the heartbeat option is enabled to all the nodes listed in the ccirmtd.rc file. However, explicitly setting the option in the ccirmtd.rc files takes precedence over the global flag.
CCIRMTPINGTIMEOUT
By default, the wait time for an acknowledgement to the ping from the remote node is 30 seconds. You can alter this value by setting the variable to a desired number of seconds. The minimum and maximum values allowed are 15 and 45 seconds. The value defaults to 30 seconds if any other value is set.
You can set the variables using the Configuration Settings GUI (Options, CCI Options tab) or from the command prompt by running the following commands:
cautenv setopt CAI_CCIRMT_HEARTBEAT value
cautenv setopt CCIRMTPINGTIMEOUT value
retry interval
Determines how ccirmtd behaves if the connection is dropped and specifies the number of seconds between retry connect attempts. The format is as follows:
Note: Retry interval is mainly used in conjunction with the nostart option to allow the server to sit passively and wait for incoming connection requests. If a client host goes down, the server will not attempt to reconnect.
Basic Sample Configuration
Assume you have four systems, all with node names of eight characters or less: NTSYS1, VMSSYS2, UNXSYS3, and HPNSTP4. The configuration file for each system follows:
UNIX: CCIRMTD.PRF
LOCAL = UNXSYS3 UNXSYS3 32768 startup REMOTE = NTSYS1 NTSYS1 32768 startup REMOTE = VMSSYS2 VMSSYS2 32768 startup REMOTE = HPNSTP4 HPNSTP4 32768 startup
Windows Manager: CCIRMTD.RC
LOCAL = NTSYS1 NTSYS1 32768 startup REMOTE = UNXSYS3 UNXSYS3 32768 startup REMOTE = VMSSYS2 VMSSYS2 32768 startup REMOTE = HPNSTP4 HPNSTP4 32768 startup
OpenVMS: CCIRMTD.PRF
LOCAL = VMSSYS2 VMSSYS2 32768 startup REMOTE = UNXSYS3 UNXSYS3 32768 startup REMOTE = NTSYS1 NTSYS1 32768 startup REMOTE = HPNSTP4 HPNSTP4 32768 startup
HP NonStop: CACCICFG.RMTPRF
LOCAL = HPNSTP4 HPNSTP4 32768 startup REMOTE = UNXSYS3 UNXSYS3 32768 startup REMOTE = NTSYS1 NTSYS1 32768 startup REMOTE = VMSSYS2 VMSSYS2 32768 startup
Advanced Sample Configuration
In this configuration, assume that all of the host or system names are longer than eight characters (OPENVMSSYS1, for example). The configuration files would be as follows:
UNIX: CCIRMTD.PRF
LOCAL = UNXSYS3 UNIXSERVER3 32768 startup ALIAS=UNX3 REMOTE = NTSYS1 WINNTSYS1 32768 startup ALIAS=NT1 REMOTE = VMSSYS2 OPENVMSSYS2 32768 startup ALIAS=VMSNOD2 REMOTE = HPNSTP4 HPNONSTOP4 32768 startup ALIAS=HPNS4
Windows Manager: CCIRMTD.RC
LOCAL = NTSYS1 WINNTSYS1 32768 startup ALIAS=NT1 REMOTE = UNXSYS3 UNIXSERVER3 32768 startup ALIAS=UNX3 REMOTE = VMSSYS2 32768 OPENVMSSYS2 startup ALIAS=VMSNOD2 REMOTE = HPNSTP4 HPNONSTOP4 32768 startup ALIAS=HPNS4
OpenVMS: CCIRMTD.PRF
LOCAL = VMSSYS2 OPENVMSSYS2 32768 startup ALIAS=VMSNOD2 REMOTE = UNXSYS3 UNIXSERVER3 32768 startup ALIAS=UNX3 REMOTE = NTSYS1 WINNTSYS1 32768 startup ALIAS=NT1 REMOTE = HPNSTP4 HPNONSTOP4 32768 startup ALIAS=HPNS4
HP NonStop: CACCICFG.RMTPRF
LOCAL = HPNSTP4 HPNONSTOP4 32768 startup ALIAS=HPNS4 REMOTE = UNXSYS3 UNIXSERVER3 32768 startup ALIAS=UNX3 REMOTE = NTSYS1 WINNTSYS1 32768 startup ALIAS=NT1 REMOTE = VMSSYS2 OPENVMSSYS2 32768 startup ALIAS=VMSNOD2
Configure CAICCI on Windows
During post-installation, you must configure CAICCI on every Windows machine on which you have installed the Unicenter Universal Job Management Agent (UJMA).
To configure CAICCI on Windows
To configure CAICCI on Linux or UNIX