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In IBM System z9 mainframes, z9 Integrated Information Processor (zIIP) is a special purpose processor, the main purpose of which is to offload DB2 processing from the general mainframe central processors (CPs). The idea originated with previous special purpose processors, the zAAP and IFL, that offload Java and Linux processing, respectively. DB2 for z/OS V8 is the first application to exploit the zIIP. The zIIP requires a System z9 or newer mainframe. The z/OS 1.8 and DB2 9 for z/OS support zIIPs. IBM also offers PTFs for z/OS 1.6, z/OS 1.7, and DB2 to enable zIIP usage. DB2 9 for z/OS is the first release of DB2 that has support built in.
IBM publicly disclosed information about zIIP technology on January 24, 2006. The zIIP hardware (i.e. microcode, as the processors hardware does not differ from general CPU) became generally available in May, 2006. The z/OS and DB2 PTFs to take advantage of the zIIP hardware became generally available in late June, 2006.
zIIPs add lower cost capacity for four types of DB2 work:
- Remote DRDA access via TCP/IP. This category includes JDBC and ODBC access to DB2, including access across LPARs via Hipersockets, such as Linux on System z9. The exception is access to DB2 V8 stored procedures, which redirect a small portion of the work. DB2 9 native remote SQL procedures do use the zIIP.
- Parallel query operations. DB2 9 can increase the amount of parallel processing and thus use the zIIP more.
- XML parsing in DB2 can use zIIP processors or zAAP processors
- Certain DB2 utilities processing.
Support for zIIPs
Although DB2 UDB for z/OS was the first product released that exploited zIIPs, it is not limited to just DB2 or IBM products. For example, zIIPs can also be used for IPSec processing in TCP/IP, and some third-party independent software vendors (ISVs) have announced support for execution of their products on zIIPs.
They include CA (formerly Computer Associates) and BMC Software. For example, the CA NetMaster Network Management for TCP/IP product can run both its main task and packet analyzer subtask on a zIIP.
