Prerequisites and system preparation

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Before you install and run Instana Observability on z/OS, your system must meet the hardware requirements and have the software prerequisites installed.

The latest available service is downloaded

Download the Instana Observability on z/OS latest service. Depending on the platform you are using, download the available fixes for both host and distributed machines from:

IBM Z APM Connect Distributed Gateway installation prerequisites

IBM Z APM Connect Distributed Gateway (IBM Z APM Connect DG) supports the flow of data from z/OS® into the APM solutions. This component must be installed on a Linux distributed system with connectivity to your monitored z/OS systems and to APM solutions.

IBM Z APM Connect DG offers two installation options. The prerequisites that you should prepare depend on the installation option that you choose.
Note: For production purposes, it is recommended to deploy Distributed Gateway images in either an OpenShift or CNCF Kubernetes cluster. The cluster deployment ensures optimal performance and scalability, especially when dealing with large volumes of trace data that needs to be processed.
  • Option 1 (cluster deployment): To install in a Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform or Kubernetes cluster on x86 or s390x based Linux:

    Table 1. Supported Linux distributions for installation in a cluster
      Versions CPU architectures
    SUSE V15 or later x86_64 / amd64
    Ubuntu V20 or later x86_64 / amd64
    Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) V7 or V8 x86_64 / amd64
    V8 s390x
    Table 2. Supported product versions
    Kubernetes V1.25 or later
    OpenShift V4.10 or V4.11
    (Required if using OpenShift) Helm V3.1 or higher
    Table 3. Resource requirements for installation in a cluster
      Minimum requirements Recommended for higher performance
    CPU cores at least 24 cores, or 8 cores per node, whichever is higher 48 cores or 8 cores per node, whichever is higher
    Memory size at least 16 GB (14.9GiB) ram, or 8 GB (7.45GiB) per node, whichever is higher 100 GB (93.3GiB) or 16 GB per node, whichever is higher
    Note: Beginning with the release of 6.1.1 fix pack 3, a separate set of Kubernetes Sandbox deployment files are shipped with the installation package. This approach uses the simplest configuration to deploy the Distributed Gateway in a Kubernetes Cluster, and is recommended for Proof of Concept/evaluation purposes. The minimum recommended resources for this approach are 16GB and 8 core.
  • Option 2: To install on x86 based Linux with Docker (V20 or later):

    Table 4. Supported Linux distributions for Docker installation
    SUSE V15 or later
    Ubuntu V20 or later
    Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) V7
    Note: RHEL V8 and later are unsupported because they do not officially support any version of Docker and the standalone Z APM Connect Distributed Gateway is currently incompatible with other container engines.
Table 5. Resource requirements for Docker installation
CPU cores No less than 4 cores
Memory size No less than 4 GBs of memory
Disk space No less than 20 GBs of free disk space

Prerequisites for the z/OS systems and subsystems from which transaction data is gathered

Before installing IBM Z APM Connect components on the z/OS side, ensure that your z/OS environment meets the prerequisites. The prerequisites depend on which types of transactions you want to track and on which z/OS systems and subsystems. Therefore, assess your installation scenario and install the prerequisites that meet your needs.

z/OS system requirements:

  • IBM z/OS 2.4 or later
    Note: Only the supported levels of z/OS and subsystems are tested. If you are using extended support for z/OS or certain subsystems, please reach out to IBM support team for assistance.
  • IBM CICS Transaction Server for z/OS V5.4 or later
  • IBM IMS V15.2 or later
  • IBM MQ for z/OS V9.1 or later
  • IBM z/OS Connect Enterprise Edition V3.0.27 or later and APAR PH09950
  • IBM CICS Transaction Gateway for z/OS V9.2 or V9.3 and APAR PH12635/PTF UI65916
  • IBM Db2 for z/OS V12.1 or later
  • (Required for JDBC-Db2 support)
    • Z Common Data Provider APAR OA63662/PTF UJ09384.
    • Z APM Connect APAR OA65201/PTF UJ93393.
Java

For CICS TG transaction tracking

  • Java V8 must be installed on both the CICS TG client application environment and the CICS TG server environment.
  • If client applications use the CICS TG resource adapter, Java EE Application Servers V8 or later is needed.

APM prerequisites

See Installing Instana.

Networking prerequisites

The various components within the z/OS system, the IBM Z APM Connect DG machine, and the Instana backend use TCP/IP for communications. Make sure you have the following ports opened for communications:

If an OpenShift route or proxy is not in use, the following ports must be open:
  • Ports used from z/OS host components to IBM Z APM Connect DG machine:
    • Z APM Connect Base proc uses port 30455
    • CICS TG server and z/OS Connect EE server use port 30090
  • Ports used from IBM Z APM Connect DG machine to Instana backend machine:

    Communicating with the Instana backend requires the serverless endpoint to be enabled, which is the default behavior. The port number is automatically handled when retrieving the serverless endpoint URL from the Instana UI and no separate configuration is needed.

Attention:
  • If using TLS, Kafka and the Connection Manager both use a Java style .jks keystore and truststore (as well as their passwords) to load certificates for TLS. Each keystore should contain a private key and a matching certificate to use for connections, and each truststore should contain the full trust chain of certificates used to validate the contents of each keystore. Java Keytool can be used to easily convert a pkcs12 keystore into .jks format.
  • TLS v1.2 is required when using TLS to connect the Z APM Connect Base to the Distributed Gateway.