Old technology using channel cables such as the IBM 3745 Communication Controller and the 3174/3274 Establishment Controllers will soon be replaced by newer technology. Remaining connections on the 3745 Communications Controller were links to the State of Nebraska and Blue Cross/Blue Shield. The CSN Networking Services team has been working with both the State and Blue Cross/Blue Shield to move these connections to new access methods. Several State of Nebraska connections (a 56K Analog and a T1 Frame Relay) are being replaced by a 10Mb TLIS connection which will provide support for TN3270, access to State of Nebraska Budget server, and secured FTP services. The dedicated line to Blue Cross/Blue Shield (56 Kbps Analog) via the 3745 will be replaced with a direct serial connection to our CSN router which will still maintain a secured “dedicated” connection.

Some of our clients that formerly used the old connections to the State House have already moved to the new TLIS access. Services such as the CSN JES2 to State of Nebraska VM connection are being dropped completely as they are no longer being used. To verify this, the JES2 connection was varied INACTVE back in February 2002 with the option to re-activate if necessary. No requests to activate it were ever received and it will be dropped forever on April 7, 2002.

The change of access to Blue Cross/Blue Shield will use the same circuit so it will require some testing within the next couple weeks and then finally a complete cutover. We expect all remaining services to be moved to their new access by May 1, 2002. At that time we will physically remove the 3475 Communication Controller.

The 3174/3274 Establishment Controllers which currently provide master console support for our multiple MVS and VM systems will be replaced with a single IBM 2074 Model 2 Console Support Controller. The 3174/3274 Establishment Controller technology used channel cables for connections and required each MVS or VM system (or partition) to have its own controller for console support. Consoles were connected to their supporting controller via coax cables. We are currently using 8 different controllers to provide this function.

With the single IBM 2074 Model 2 Console Support Controller, we will be able to support up to 32 different systems (with the potential of 64 if necessary.). Master Console PCs can be connected using our existing 100 Mbps Ethernet network and a TN3270E emulator. The IBM 2074 Model 2 Console Support Controller is a protocol converter that transforms 3174 non-SNA, Distributed Function Terminal (DFT) ESCON data streams into LAN-based TN3270E data streams.