Identical setup across a sysplex

z/OS® Explorer configuration files (and code) can be shared across different systems in a sysplex, with each system running its own identical copy of z/OS Explorer, if a few guidelines are obeyed. Note that this information is for stand-alone z/OS Explorer instances. Additional rules for the TCP/IP setup apply when using Distributed Dynamic VIPA to group multiple servers (each on a separate system) into one virtual server, as documented in Distributed Dynamic VIPA.

• The log files should end up in unique locations to avoid one system overwriting information from another. By routing the z/OS UNIX logs to specific locations with the daemon.log and user.log directives in rse.env, you can share the configuration files if you mount a system specific z/OS UNIX file system on the specified path. This way, all logs are written to the same logical place, but due to the unshared file system underneath, they end up in different physical locations.
• Configuration-type directories like /etc/zexpl/ and /var/zexpl/pushtoclient/ can be shared across the sysplex, as z/OS Explorer uses them in read-only mode.
• Temporary data directories like /tmp/ and /var/zexpl/WORKAREA/ must be unique per system, because temporary file names are not sysplex-aware.
• If you share the code, you should also share the configuration files to ensure you do not have some systems that are out of synchronization after applying maintenance.
• If you share an active /etc/zexpl/pushtoclient.properties configuration file, you must also share the related metadata directory, /var/zexpl/pushtoclient/.