How can I tell if VMS (Vault Management System) is currently managing tapes?

Products

• CA 1 Flexible Storage

Issue/Introduction

How can I determine whether CA1 VMS (Vault Management System) is active or not?  Are there any CA1 parameters that are used to activate this feature? 

Environment

Release : 14.0

Component : CA 1 Tape Management

Resolution

To determine if VMS is being used, the TMSGRW report can be run to check the OUTCODE field of tape volumes for blanks or hex zeros or the character string 'blankVMS'.  If the OUTCODE field does not contain any one of these 3 values, then the volume is being managed by VMS.  Sample TMSGRW code: 

DEFINE VALUE1 CH '_VMS'
DEFINE VALUE2 HX '40404040'
DEFINE VALUE3 HX '00000000;

WHEN OUTCODE EQ VALUE1 
   OR OUTCODE EQ VALUE2
   OR OUTCODE EQ VALUE3 
REJECT
WHEN VOLSER EQ VOLSER LIST.

Another way to test for out-of-area VMS tapes is to run the TMEOUTA Earl report.  The source Earl code can be found in the *.CTAPEARL data set, in member TMEOUTA. 

Note that CA1 does not have any parameters which activate or deactivate VMS use.  This is strictly controlled via the TMSUPDTE utility and the VMS batch utilities.  The VMS batch utilities include TMSVMEDT, TMSVMVLT, TMSVMUPD, and EARL reports.  The TMSVMUPD step in the TMSVMS batch job (see the *.CTAPJCL data set) makes the updates to the TMC.

 

Additional Information

CA1 Utilities and Reports manual: 

https://techdocs.broadcom.com/us/en/ca-mainframe-software/performance-and-storage/ca-1-tape-management-system/14-0/utilities-and-reports.html