Deploying to z/OS with IBM Wazi Deploy
IBM Wazi Deploy is a DevOps tool that automates the deployment of applications to z/OS® to address the lack of deployment options for mainframe environments.
It accelerates the customization and automation of z/OS application deployment for test and production environments in a continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipeline. New versions of applications can be deployed as frequently as necessary, without stopping the application server, as the applications are deployed in real time. It uses the open source standard technologies and languages that are widely used with distributed and Cloud applications.
In a static deployment, all the components of an application can be described in a manifest file. This file defines a version of the application that is stored in an artifact repository. The deployment process and the target environment configurations are described in YAML files that are meant to be stored in a modern source control management (SCM) tool like Git. Finally, Wazi Deploy uses Ansible® or Python to deploy artifacts to a target z/OS environment.
No server is involved. Wazi Deploy is solely constituted of a command-line interface.
- The continuous integration, where the applications are built. The builds can be triggered after code fixes or the development of new features. The build results, such as load modules or DBRMs, are uploaded to an artifact repository.
- The continuous delivery, where Wazi Deploy is triggered. Wazi Deploy deploys the binary files that have been produced and uploaded to an artifact repository. It deploys the artifacts to a test environment, and if the tests are correct, to the integration and production environment. So the same deployment process applies from test to production.
The same end-to-end pipeline can be used across the organization for z/OS, distributed, and Cloud applications. You can watch the Wazi Deploy video to see how Wazi Deploy is used in a CI/CD pipeline to automate the deployment of z/OS applications.
The traceability of the deployed artifacts is covered by the production of evidence files at the end of each deployment step.
For this release, Wazi Deploy is designed to deploy CICS® Db2®, IMS, and any z/OS batch applications. It is available through IBM® Developer for z/OS.
Overall deployment process for a static deployment
- From a local folder that contains the artifacts of an application, a package is created and uploaded to an artifact repository. A manifest file, which can be automatically created, lists and describes the artifacts of the corresponding package.
- From a deployment method that contains the deployment actions, a deployment plan is generated. This plan applies the deployment actions to the application package.
- The application package is deployed to the target z/OS environment. The deployment is driven by the generated deployment plan and the Wazi Deploy Ansible or Python building blocks that implement the deployment actions.
Overall usage scenario with role-based tasks
- The system programmer installs and configures Wazi Deploy.
- The enterprise architect defines and implements the deployment actions.
- The release engineer creates a package from a local folder that contains the artifacts of an application for a static deployment. This package is manually or automatically uploaded to an artifact repository. Then, the release engineer runs the Wazi Deploy generation command so that the deployment actions are applied to the artifacts to be deployed. Finally, the release engineer deploys to the target z/OS environment.
- The build administrator integrates the Wazi Deploy deployment into a CI/CD pipeline. When a z/OS developer commits code changes to Git, then the pipeline is automatically triggered and the code changes are deployed.