z14

Today July 17th 2017 IBM announced the new mainframe called IBM z14. Planned availability date is September 13, 2017.

IBM z14 glass model

From a Linux perspective the IBM tested platforms has been updated to include z14. The following minimum levels are required:

• Red Hat (certifications)
  • RHEL 7.3 – GA kernel
  • RHEL 6.9 – tbd
• SUSE
  • SLES 11.4 (certification) -minimum kernel 3.0.101-108.10, RoCE Express2 not supported
  • SLES 12.2 (certification) -minimum kernel 4.4.74-92.35.1
• Canonical
  • Ubuntu (certification) 16.04.3 LTS – minimum kernel level LTS 4.4.0-96-generic
• If you are using secure key with the new cards, updates are required to the respective libs you use and the TKE. Minumum levels
  • TKE 9.0
  • csulcca-5.2.23-12, ep11-host-1.3.0-3, ep11-host-devel-1.3.0-3, libep11-dev_1.3.0-3, libep11_1.3.0-3

z14 exploitation of new features:

• Red Hat
  • DTS 7.0 with new compiler and binutils
• SUSE
  • Update for gcc and binutils in toolchain module

Useful links:

• z14 announcement letter and press release
• LinuxONE Emperor II announcement letter and press release
• z14 entry page, z14 data sheet, z14 FAQs, LinuxONE FAQs, LinuxONE data sheet at IBM
• Large Systems Performance Reference for IBM Z 
• z/Architecture Principles of Operation SA22-7832-11
• z/VM
  • z/VM requirements page
  • exploitation for pause less garbage collection: VM65987
• Redbooks:
  • IBM z14 Technical Introduction
  • IBM z14 Technical Guide
  • IBM Z Connectivity Handbook
  • IBM Z Functional Matrix
• IBM Db2 Analytics Accelerator for z/OS, V7.1
  • Announcement
• Articles and paper:
  • Java With z14 Features Hardware Facilities for Secure, High-Performance Transaction Processing

(updated 11/28/2017)