Shield Adds IFS Replication to HA Offering

February 23, 2010 Alex Woodie

i/OS shops using Shield Advanced Solutions‘ Receiver Apply Program (RAP) to replicate data and objects between System i servers will now be able to replicate data housed in their System i servers’ Integrated File System (IFS) as the result of new RAP features unveiled yesterday.

The addition of IFS support is one of the final major features needed for RAP to be considered an HA product, says Chris Hird, president of Shield Advanced Solutions, which is based near Toronto, Canada. “Having been involved in the HA market space for 20 years, I believe the product now provides the essential requirements for an HA solution,” Hird says.

When Shield launched RAP in 2007, the product provided a bare bones framework to replicate DB2/400 data using the journaling and remote journaling technology that IBM builds into the i/OS operating system. (Actually, remote journaling resides below the operating system level, but that’s a topic for another story.)

Shield gradually added more capabilities over the years, including automated synchronization, auditing, user profile replication, automated role-swaps, support for independent auxiliary storage pools (iASPs), and automation of object replication.

With this week’s launch, the product gains full status as an HA product, according to Hird. “We have added many new features in this release that now put the product in the High Availability (HA) Solution category,” he says.

Support for IFS replication and a more efficient method of i/OS object replication were the big new features in this release, Hird says.

Other notable new RAP features include: support for “active job snapshots,” which create a copy of the WRKACTJOB screens for viewing on the remote system; improved flexibility for the configuration of remote journals and receiver libraries; new journal management tools for handling receiver changes using the IBM job scheduler; and improved role swap programs that include built-in restart capabilities.

The features were added as a program temporary fix (PTF) to RAP V4R1, which Shield launched 10 months ago. The company decided not to issue a new version or release number because it is a significant new release that adds a lot of features, and it wanted to streamline the upgrade process for existing customers, Hird says.

Pricing, which is tier based, starts at $3,500 and has not changed. For more information, visit Shield’s recently refurbished Web site at www.shield.on.ca.