Question regarding RETPD on tapes or DASD data sets

Products

• Disk Backup and Restore - MVS
• DISK BACKUP AND RESTORE- ADD-ON OPTIO
• DISK BACKUP AND RESTORE

Issue/Introduction

If I were to try to convert a tape dsn to dasd, what happens to a disk data set after the RETPD has passed. Would I have to go in and manually delete the data set ?

Resolution

When you Archive data sets either to a tape Archvol or to a Disk Archvol, a DSNINDEX record is stored for every data set in the FILES data set.
Every DSNINDEX record has an expiration date. So, when an expiration date expires, or the data set is Restored, that DSNINDEX record is deleted.
 
So, just like a Tape Archvol can have dead or expired data on it, so can a Disk Archvol have expired data.
Thus the need to run a Merge on Disk Archvols as you would Tape Archvols, so the remaining valid (unexpired) data is moved forward to new Archvols.