SENTINELn

See Every Change. Control Every Outcome.

Let the watchguard protect your z/OS data sets. Real time monitoring, automated backup recovery, proactive reporting, and member-level access is all one tool away with SENTINELn.

Investing In The Future

Data Set Protection Retooled and Reimagined

SENTINELn is a robust change management solution designed to monitor, track, and restore z/OS data sets with absolute precision. With built-in recovery, a dynamic user interface and audit readiness, your teams can confidently program without compromising critical z/OS data sets.

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Why SENTINELn Is Different

See Every Change. Every Time.

Total control and awareness of your z/OS system.

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    Automated Backup Control

    Automatically captures member-level backups, maintaining a history of versioned resources to improve data protection and control. 

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    Real Time Monitoring and Recovery

    Tracks real-time changes to critical system and application software. Seamlessly roll back changes and restore data backups. 

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    Manage Member-Level Access

    Controls library modifications by limiting access to designated members, ensuring only approved users are permitted to make changes. 

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    Documentation of Changes

    Enables users to record the purpose of updates made to critical members of protected resources, creating a clear audit trail that supports accountability and thorough change documentation. 

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    Auditing and Integrity Verification

    Generates detailed reports, ensuring the integrity of your production data sets and load libraries.

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    Automation Pipeline Integration

    Command-line interface enables seamless integration with automation pipelines. Teams can automate processes faster, improve reliability, and scale operations with confidence.

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Auditing made easy with SENTINELn

  • Monitored Resources

    Monitored Resources

     

    This shows the initial view seen. Lists the protected data sets.

    Example - LYG.SENTINEL.DEMO.DS1 – DS3 are shown as protected.

  • DS Audit Log

    DS Audit Log

    Example - ‘View audit log’ was selected for data set LYG.SENTINEL.DEMO.DS1. It shows:

    - Member DS1MEM1 had 1 update          - Member DS1MEM2 was DELeted then ADDed

    - Member DS1MEM4 was ADDed          - Member DS1M3NEW was original named DS1MEM3

    Actions Show:

    - the User who initiated the event          - the Job that called the program to cause the event

    - the Date/Time when the event was recorded         - the Program that caused the event

    When selecting “Browse Members” of a data set, you can look at information relating to just that data set.

  • 2a Browse Resources

    Browse Resources

    Like the initial plugin screen, except narrowing down to a data set.

    Example - For LYG.SENTINEL.DEMO.DS1, shows there are currently 4 members within the data set.

  • Member Audit Log

    Member Audit Log

    This displays the audit log for a member and all events registered against it. Displays the same information as the previous audit log, just filtered to a member. Useful if a data set contains a lot of events and you just want to focus on a member at a time.

    Example - Same as before, just focuses on DS1MEM2.

  • Member Backup

    Member Backup

    When selecting to “Recover backups”, a list of backups associated to then member is shown.

    NOTE – this is only available if the option to take backups was set when initially protecting the data set.

    Example - Member DS1MEM2 of LYG.SENTINEL.DEMO.DS1DS1MEM2 has 2 versions.

    - Current (what is currently available)

    - The initial version: when the data set was initially protected or when the member was first created after the data set was protected.

    - Current: the auditor has the option to browse the current member (using the eye icon)

    - 1 … -n: the auditor has the option to compare it against the current version or recover the backup (no screenshot for backup recover taken, as assuming not an auditor task)

  • 2d Backup Compare

    Backup Compare

    Allows the auditor to compare a backup version against the current version.

    Example

    - The Current version is shown on the left.

    - The selected backup version (in this case -1 as that is the only version) is shown on the right.

    - The backup version is listed in a data set with a unique name (associated to the User and the date/time). This data set name can me modified. If the auditor choses to modify the backup version, it can be saved to the temporary data set. The backup itself cannot be overwritten.

  • Compare Change

    Compare

    Allows the auditor to compare 2 data sets. These do not have to be protected in Change Tracker.

    Example - 2 data sets were set to be compared:

    - LYG.SENTINEL.DEMO.SOURCE.DS1 – contains 3 members

    - LYG.SENTINEL.DEMO.COMPARE.DS2 – contains 3 members

    - DS1MEM3 is missing (deleted) from LYG.SENTINEL.DEMO.COMPARE.DS2

    - DS2MEM3 was added to LYG.SENTINEL.DEMO.COMPARE.DS2

    - Both data sets contain MEMBER1 and the contents are the same for each

    - Both data sets contain MEMBER2, but the contents differ between them

  • 3b Compare

    Compare Change

    When a compare highlights a difference between members, a compare can be done to look at what the differences are.

    Example - From earlier, MEMBER2 is showing a difference. Compare shows the original (source) on the left and what it is being compared to on the right. Here we see that ds1 has been changed to ds2.

Turning Data Set Modification Into Tracked Solutions

  • The Challenge

    Tracking System Errors

    If something goes wrong in system configuration, time is of the essence to restore system integrity.

    The Solution

    SENTINELn's real-time monitoring creates backups at the moment change are made. If issues arise later, you can easily backtrack through a member's history, restore to a known stable point, and immediately get the systems back up and running. Then, SENTINELn's audit capabilities pinpoint the exact change that caused the outage.

  • The Challenge

    Awareness of System Updates

    For organizations comprised of globally dispersed teams of systems programmers, it can be hard to tell what changes are occurring and when data sets are modified.

    The Solution

    Beyond recording all updates at the time they are made, SENTINELn captures snapshots of the state of critical data sets at a given point in time. These snapshots can be compared to show what members were changed between two points in time. For example, this can be used to watch for changes in SYS1.* datasets week to week.

  • The Challenge

    Controlling Data Set Access

    Specific data sets must be locked down; however, an edit needs to be made. Opening the whole data set is too permissive.

    The Solution

    SENTINELn allows a designated user or group to temporarily check out and modify a single member at a time while the rest of the data set remains locked. Checkouts support comments, allowing users to document the reason a specific member was checked out.

     

  • The Challenge

    Complex System Configuration Onboarding

    For new systems programmer trainees, understanding the full scope and details of a system’s configuration is a substantial undertaking, made more difficult by insufficient documentation.

    The Solution

    SENTINELn allows comments at the time of update and records them in the member’s version history, enabling each change to be examined in isolation with clear context for why it was made.

    See How SENTINELn Will Safeguard Your Organization

    Learn how SENTINELn protects your data sets with real-time change tracking, automatic backups, and side-by-side comparison all in one intuitive platform.

    Schedule a Consultation