Some reports are working properly and some are not after changing Deliver and View option ARCH=1 to ARCH=DIRECT?

Products

• Balancing

Issue/Introduction

Some reports are working properly and some are not after changing Deliver and View option ARCH=1 to ARCH=DIRECT?

 

Environment

Release: OUTB..00200-1.1-Balancing
Component:

Resolution

How Balancing works 

Balancing will allocate the VIEW (SAR) database to run the RULESET jobs (reports) and follow whatever guidelines are required. 

The OPEN of the VIEW DB is a READ ONLY function and requires access to the INDEX portion of the RSDS DB file. 

Only information in the INDEX will be considered obtainable. This is important to know. 

How View and Deliver works 

With ARCH=1 the output is spooled to the JES spool and then VIEW will open the spool and move the output to the SAR DB. This is done by opening the spool file and sequentially downloading the information to the SAR DB and updating the INDEX in the SAR DB as it goes. 

With ARCH=DIRECT/SAR DB Name the output is NEVER sent to the JES spool and the output is dumped into the View SAR DB as a OPEN FILE. The file stays open until all the writes are completed and the the INDEX is updated. Depending on how large the output dump is at the time this could take many minutes. Plus you then have the internal index update within the RSDS file. This could lead to a large clock time window where not all items are updated in the index of the RSDS and "some" Balancing reports will not be correct and yet "some" will be correct. 

In Summary 

The problem is most prevalent when the spool was not used and the sequential updates were not performed to the CA View SAR DB and less prevalent when the spool is utilized. 

Balancing is doing exactly what it is supposed to do. View and Deliver is working as designed. 
View and Deliver support recommend the same process as Balancing support. 

Use ARCH=DIRECT/SAR DB name if you like but all Balancing jobs must have a time delay so the index has time to be updated and the reports will find the data. 

Use ARCH=1 and Balancing will still require a time delay, although smaller, so the index is updated and the reports can be acquired. 

Nothing is broken, this is a product design. All that is required is a time delay for the Balancing reports before they are submitted. Some customers recommend 5 to 10 minutes before jobs for Balancing are submitted for execution.