How Mainframe customers can cut cost through FRCA caching in WebSphere Application Server for zOS

If you  deploy WAS on zOS and serve static (images, css files, static HTML) and dynamic content  (servlets, JSPs) from your application please stop and read this blog post.

Starting WAS 7 WebSphere Application Server for z/OS can be configured to use the Fast Response Cache Accelerator facility of the z/OS Communications

Server TCP/IP FRCA has been used for years inside the IBM HTTP Server to cache static contents like pictures or HTML files.

The high speed-cache can now be used to cache static and dynamic contents, such as servlets and JSP files, instead of using the WebSphere Application Server Dynamic Cache.

ROI Benefits of using FRCA to cache static and dynamic content  in a customer retail application to zOS customers can be seen in the two charts below:

Exploitation of FRCA is really as an extension to the existing Dynamic Cache (“DynaCache”) capability of each Application Server.FRCA is defined as an “External Cache Group,”and the “Adapter Bean”is what provides the function to access FRCA. Application servers > [server] > Dynamic cache service > External cache group.

In addition to enabling FRCA you will also need to write a cachespec.xml that tells Dynacache what to cache in the FRCA cache and drop it in the application's WEB-INF directory. A sample of this cachespec.xml  for caching ALL static content can be found here.

Detailed description on HOW to configure FRCA for WAS can be found in the Chapter 7 of WebSphere Application Server V7 Administration and Configuration Guide, SG24-7615.