VSE
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- This page is about the VSE operating system. For other uses see VSE (disambiguation).
VSE (Virtual Storage Extended) is an operating system for IBM mainframe computers. Primary development occurs in IBM's Böblingen, Germany, labs. It is less common than z/OS and is mostly used on smaller machines. It is the successor to DOS/VSE which in turn followed DOS/360. Thus, VSE traces its roots back to the mid-1960s System/360.
VSE originally supported 24-bit addressing. As the underlying hardware evolved, VSE acquired support for 31-bit addressing. IBM has no plans to extend z/VSE's addressing to z/Architecture's 64-bit design — z/VSE's small, efficient applications would gain no benefit (and indeed might suffer a penalty). Instead, IBM recommends that VSE customers run Linux on zSeries alongside, on the same physical system, to provide a 64-bit application environment that can access and extend VSE applications and data via Hipersockets.
JCS (Job Control Statements) are VSE's batch processing interfaces. There is also a special interface used by system console operators. CICS, one of the most popular enterprise transaction processing systems, is extremely popular among VSE users and now supports recent innovations such as Web services. DB2 is also available and popular.
VSE, like z/OS systems, has traditionally supported 3270 terminal user interfaces. However, most VSE users have at least begun to add Web browser access to VSE applications. Unusually, VSE's TCP/IP is a separately priced option for historic reasons and is available in two different versions from two vendors, including through IBM. Most VSE sites do add TCP/IP.
VSE celebrated its 40th birthday in March, 2005. The latest release (as of September, 2005) is z/VSE 3.1. z/VSE adds several new features, including support for more affordable SCSI storage devices. z/VSE is still compatible with 31-bit mainframes and does not require a z/Architecture server, although 64-bit Linux support is one reason why z/VSE users may replace 31-bit mainframes.