(Optional) pushtoclient.properties, the host-based client control

z/OS® Explorer clients can pull client configuration files and product update information from the host system when they connect, ensuring that all clients have common settings and that they are up-to-date.

pushtoclient.properties tells the client if these functions are enabled, and where the related data is stored. The data is maintained by a z/OS Explorer client administrator.

pushtoclient.properties is located in /etc/zexpl/, unless you specified a different location when you customized and submitted the FEK.SFEKSAMP(FEKSETUP) job. For more details, see Customization setup. You can edit the file with the TSO OEDIT command. Changes are active for all new invocations. No server restart is needed.

The client administrator can create multiple client configuration sets and multiple client update scenarios to fit the needs of different developer groups. These multiple sets and scenarios can be used to provide users with a customized setup, based on criteria such as membership of an LDAP group or permit to a security profile. For more information about supporting multiple groups, see “Push-to-client considerations” in Host Configuration Reference (SC27-8438).

The following code sample shows the pushtoclient.properties file, which must be customized to match your system environment. Comment lines start with a number sign (#) when using a US code page. Data lines can have only a directive and its assigned value. Comments are not allowed on the same line. Line continuations are not supported.

#
# host–based client control 
#
config.enabled=false
product.enabled=false
reject.config.updates=false
reject.product.updates=false
accept.product.license=false
primary.system=false
pushtoclient.folder=/var/zexpl/pushtoclient
default.store=com.ibm.ftt.configurations.USS
file.permission=RWX.RWX.RX

config.enabled

Indicates whether host-based client control is used for configuration files. The default is false. The valid values are true, false, LDAP, or SAF. For the meaning of these values, see Table 1.

product.enabled

Indicates whether host-based client control is used for product updates. The default is false. The valid values are true, false, LDAP, or SAF. For the meaning of these values, see Table 1.

reject.config.updates

Indicates whether a user can reject configuration updates that are pushed to the client. The default is false. The valid values are true, false, LDAP, or SAF. For the meaning of these values, see Table 1.

reject.product.updates

Indicates whether a user can reject product updates that are pushed to the client. The default is false. The valid values are true, false, LDAP, or SAF. For the meaning of these values, see Table 1.

accept.product.license

Indicates whether the product license is automatically accepted during updates that are initiated by push-to-client. If enabled, IBM® Installation Manager does not ask to accept the license during client update. The default is false. The only valid values are true and false.

primary.system

Host-based client control supports storing system-specific data for each system, while maintaining common data on a single system to reduce management effort. This directive indicates whether this is the system that stores global, non-system specific, client definitions. The default is false. The only valid values are true and false.

Note: Ensure that you have one, and only one, system that is defined as primary system. z/OS Explorer client administrators cannot export global configuration data unless the target system is a primary system. z/OS Explorer clients might show erratic behavior when connecting to multiple primary systems with out-of-sync configurations.

pushtoclient.folder

The base directory for the host-based client control definitions. The default is /var/zexpl/pushtoclient.

default.store

Host-based client control supports different methods for storing the data that is pushed to the client. This directive identifies the driver, or store, that is used to access the data. The default is com.ibm.ftt.configurations.USS, which supports the data being stored in z/OS UNIX flat files.

z/OS Explorer only provides the com.ibm.ftt.configurations.USS store. A third-party store is needed when the data is located somewhere else.

file.permission

The com.ibm.ftt.configurations.USS store uses file.permission to determine the required access permissions for files that are created by the store. The default is RWX.RWX.RX, which allows the owner and the owner's default group read and write access to the directory structure and the files within. Everyone else has only read access to the directory structure and the files within.

According to the UNIX standards, permissions can be set for three types of users: owner, group, and other. The fields in the file.permission mask match this order, and the fields are separated by a period (.). Each field can either be empty, or have R, W, RW, X, RX, WX, or RWX as value (where R = read, W = write, X = execute or list directory content).