A user type defines a class of users, such as administrators, ordinary users, operators, and so on. When enrolling a user through the Information Center Facility ENROLL option, an administrator specifies a user type. Associated with each user type is the following information the system needs to define the user to the system and define the type of access the user has to various parts of the system.

USERID Information

When you use Information Center Facility panels to define a user to TSO/E, you supply user ID information that automatically becomes the parameters for the TSO/E ACCOUNT command and/or RACF® commands, depending on how your installation is set up. If your installation uses the ACCOUNT command, the user ID information is stored in the user attributes data set (UADS) named SYS1.UADS. If your installation uses RACF commands, the user ID information is stored in the RACF data base. For more information about the ways to define users to TSO/E, see Defining Users to TSO/E.

RACF Security Information

RACF is an optional security server that protects system resources. You can supply information on Information Center Facility panels to define a user to an existing RACF group. A RACF group is a collection of RACF users who have the same access requirements to protected resources. A RACF administrator gives the appropriate access authority to each group.

VSAM Master Catalog Information

The master catalog keeps track of data sets in the system. You can use Information Center Facility panels to supply information for the VSAM DEFINE ALIAS command that puts a user catalog alias for the user's TSO/E ID into the master catalog. This action can improve performance by decreasing the time required to locate the user's data sets.

One of your jobs as an administrator is to maintain a set of user type definitions. The Information Center Facility supplies two pre-defined user types: USER and ADMINISTRATOR. If they are not suitable for all users at your installation, you can add new user types. You can also modify current user type definitions and delete those that are no longer needed. To aid in choosing and maintaining user types, you can display either a list of the currently defined user types, which includes a brief description of each, or a particular user type definition (that is, the information it specifies). For descriptions of the information each user type can include, see:

• TSO/E User ID Information
• TSO/E Authorization Information
• RACF Security Information
• Optional RACF Information
• VSAM DEFINE ALIAS Parameters