Supported drivers for JDBC

The IMS Universal JDBC driver supports the type-2 and type-4 JDBC architectures.

The table below lists the IMS support available for the four types of JDBC driver architectures:
Table 1. JDBC driver architectures supported by IMS
JDBC driver architecture Description IMS support
Type-1 Drivers that implement the JDBC API as a mapping to another data access API, such as Open Database Connectivity (ODBC). Drivers of this type are generally dependent on a native library, which limits their portability. IMS does not support a type-1 driver.
Type-2 Drivers that are written partly in the Java™ programming language and partly in native code. The drivers use a native client library specific to the data source to which they connect. Because of the native code, their portability is limited. Java programs with type 2 JDBC connectivity can run on the same z/OS® system or zSeries logical partition (LPAR) as the target IMS subsystem.

Use the IMS Universal JDBC driver with type-2 connectivity to access IMS from WebSphere® Application Server for z/OS, IMS Java Dependent Regions (JDRs), and CICS®.

Type-3 Drivers that use a pure Java client and communicate with a server using a database-independent protocol. The server then communicates the client's requests to the data source. IMS does not support a type-3 driver.
Type-4 Drivers that are pure Java and implement the network protocol for a specific data source. The client connects directly to the data source.

Use the IMS Universal JDBC driver with type-4 connectivity to access the IMS subsystem via a TCP/IP network connection.