Recently a customer shared an experience with me that I think will interest other SDS customers.
The customer was trying to get a handle on the number of FTP transfers coming in from remote users. He coded a custom VFTP query to report FTP activity from a particular subnet: the corporate subnet from which files were transferred into the z/OS mainframe.
That custom query led him to identify a large number of FTP transfers that he was previously not aware of. They were all inbound transfers to the mainframe from one particular remote host. And they arrived every two hours, indicating an automated process.
With VFTP, the customer identified the remote host and user responsible. He contacted the user and learned that many of the transferred reports were no longer needed.
So they disabled almost half of those automated FTP transfers.
Here is how the customer set up the custom VFTP queries and identified those redundant FTP transfers (In the example, the IP address and host name is make-believe.):
First, he defined a query to show him inbound transfers on the target subnet:
1. Log onto the VFTP user interface. Right-click on the folder .Transfer Summaries => .Remote IP
From the resulting menu, select the option New child.
2. In the New Child window, under the heading
Query records where,
use the menus and input fields to specify the following:
Remote IP of Transfer = 10.200.3.*
Direction = I - Inbound
3. Click on Save As to save the new query with the name InFrom.10.200.3.
That query revealed an exceptionally large number of transfers from one particular remote IP: 10.200.3.50. In the report on the VFTP browser display, the customer right-clicked on the record for 10.200.3.50. Then from the menu he selected Show all 3,997 transfers.
Now he saw complete details regarding each of those transfers from 10.200.3.50, over the past several months. That told him the name of the remote host. It also showed him that the transfers arrived at regular two-hour intervals.
So he went back to InFrom.10.200.3 and added the host name to query’s specifications:
4. Right-click on InFrom.10.200.3. From the menu, select Properties.
5. Under Query records where, add the specification…
Remote Hostname of Transfer = LABRAT
6. Click on Save.
Now the query focused on transfers into the mainframe from one remote machine, the LABRAT. The customer confirmed the situation, phoned the Labrat, and shutdown the redundant reports.
With VFTP, the customer was able to extract the necessary FTP transfer information in just a few minutes. To do the same task from SMF 119 records would have taken much longer.
VFTP makes it easy to see all inbound and outbound FTP transfers to the z/OS mainframe. And it is always nice to hear these success stories from our customers.
Colin van der Ross, sr. systems engineer, SDS, May 2012
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