Backup and scratch issues in an SSI configuration

Products

• VM:Tape for z/VM

Issue/Introduction

Since configuring to an SSI , we continue to experience issues with what should be automated nightly routines like vmtape backup/ scratch. Scheduled and run from vmntasks exec but when we ran it manually, we see this:

VMC70409 Starting task TMC_BACKUP in VMTAPE. DASD 0120 LINKED R/O; R/W BY VMTAPE at PPP001 ;
R/O BY VMANAGER DMSACP723I K (120) R/O VMC70038 Shared TMC environment found; VMTAPE's extended profile has been disabled. DASD 0120 DETACHED

Also, a query shows:

vmtbkp query (type print
DMSACC724I 1F0 replaces E (1F0) DMSACP723I E (1F0) R/O LAST BACKUP WAS ON '2017/337' AT '17:40' TO VOLUME 'DSK191' WITH DSN 'TMC BACKUP A1' THERE ARE CURRENTLY 0 AUDIT RECORDS IN USE AND THE AUDIT DISK IS 72% FULL PRT FILE 1349 SENT FROM VMANAGER PRT WAS 1349 RECS 0003 CPY 001 A NOHOLD NOKEEP Ready; T=0.01/0.01 10:41:19

Environment

VM:Tape configured to run in an SSI environment.

Running VMNTASKS (formerly AIC) task TMC_BACKUP.

Resolution

Some general notes regarding VMTAPE SCRATCH and the TMC Backup. If the TMC is shared, SCRATCH and BACKUP should only be run on ONE system. Because the TMC is the same TMC for all the VMTAPE servers sharing it, the TMC is updated and backed up for ALL systems when it is run on one of them.

That being said, VMTAPE REFRESH should be scheduled to run one (or more) times per day on EVERY VMTAPE system to keep the local PICK List and other files on each VMTAPE's 191 minidisk reasonably in sync with the state of the TMC.

 

Additional Information

PTF SO06447 also created for the VM Product Manager which necessitated a redesign of the TMC_BACKUP Task. The major part of the redesign is the addition of a new minidisk to the VM:Tape configuration. These changes are described and included in the UMEMO of the PTF, also included here.


:UMEMO. 
This PTF (SO06447) introduces changes to the VMNTASKS (AIC) TMC_BACKUP task. Most important is that it requires a new minidisk to be defined to hold the VM:Tape TMC and AUDIT file backups. This new minidisk must also be added to the VMSERVER NAMES file entry for your VMTAPE server with a TAG name of "tmcbkup". The "tmcbkup" TAG VALUE describes the minidisk owner and its virtual address.