The following is a reprint of the article in the November 1992 UTCC Newsletter about tape management software at the time the software was upgraded to a year 2000 compliant release. Sections of the original article about using tape management software on the VAX cluster have been removed from this reprint. ------------------------------------------------------------------ On November 8, UTCC upgraded the tape management software (TMS) shared by MVS and VM/CMS. If you use tapes on either of these sys- tems, you will see differences. You may need to change your current procedures to work with the new TMS. You may want to change your current procedures to use its new features. The new TMS offers se- veral enhancements. The old TMS would let you keep tapes until 1998, with the new TMS you can keep tapes through the 21st century; it will accept more user-friendly specifications about how long you want to retain a tape in the tape library; and it will produce more user-friendly reports. TAPE RETENTION The first time you use a tape, the TMS makes you the owner of the tape. Becoming the tape owner is called "checking out the tape." The TMS will retain for you until the date you specify that you will finish the tape. This date is called the tape expiration date. On the expiration date, the TMS will return the tape to the pool of tapes available for use by anyone. You can specify an expiration date in one of two ways. First, you can specify an expiration date explicitly, e.g., day 243 of year 1994. Use this form with EXPDT (EXPiration DaTe) parameters. Second, you can specify an expiration date as a retention period, e.g., 730 days from today. Use this form with RETPD (RETention PerioD) parameters. The operating system converts a retention period into an expiration date, then saves the expiration date. TAPE RETENTION LIMITED IN OLD TMS With the old TMS, you specified the expiration dates in a five-digit format like yyddd. In this format, yy specified the last two digits of the 20th century year, and ddd specified the relative day of the year. For example, a tape with the expiration date 94027 would re- turn to the free tape pool on the 27th day of 1994. The old TMS limited tape expiration dates to dates before 1998 because (1) it did not support expiration dates in the 21st century, and (2) it re- served dates in the years 1998 and 1999 to represent special re- tention criteria. If you specified a date in 1998 or 1999 when you checked out a tape, the old TMS would retain the tape until a date determined by: DATE RETENTION 99365 Retain the tape permanently. 99000 Retain the tape while this data set is cataloged in the MVS system catalog. 99ccc Retain the most recent ccc tapes that contain this data set name. 98nnn Retain the tape nnn days after last used. THE NEW TMS EXPANDS RETENTION The new TMS will: o allow expiration dates in the 21st century; o distinguish between reserved dates in 1998 and 1999 and real dates in those years; o display tape expiration dates in a friendlier format; and o let you specify keywords for the special retention criteria on some UTCC systems. The new TMS will let you specify expiration dates either in a five- digit (yyddd) format or in an eight-character (yyyy/ddd) format. If you specify the five-digit format, then yy will specify the last two digits of the 20th century year; ddd will specify the relative day of the year. If you specify the eight-character format, then yyyy will specify all four digits of the year, ddd will specify the rela- tive day of the year. For example, a tape with expiration date ei- ther 94027 or 1994/027 will return to the free pool on the 27th day of 1994. On some UTCC systems, you can specify a keyword to request special retention criteria. The VMTAPE MOUNT command and the MVS tape utility programs will accept a keyword. In these environments, you can specify a keyword either when you check out a tape or when you update its tape catalog information. MVS JCL will not accept a keyword. If you specify a keyword, the TMS will retain the tape un- til a date determined by the following: KEYWORD RETENTION PERMANENT Retain the tape permanently. This keyword replaces the 99365 special expiration date. CATALOG Retain the tape while this data set is cataloged in the MVS system catalog. This keyword replaces the 99000 special expiration date. CYCLE/ccc Retain the most recent ccc tapes of this data set name where ccc is an integer. This keyword replaces the 99ccc special expiration date. LDATE/nnn Retain the tape for nnn days after its last use. This keyword replaces the 98nnn special expiration date. HOW THE CHANGES AFFECT MVS USERS The new TMS will require one method of providing the expiration date for JCL and a second method for the MVS tape utilities. You must use one method if you write JCL. You must use the other method if you write control statements for the MVS tape utilities. JCL MVS will accept your current JCL. For the EXPDT parameter of DD statements. MVS will accept the five-digit (yyddd) date format for pre-1998 expiration dates. Also, MVS will accept 99365, 99000, 99ccc, or 98nnn to represent special retention criteria. MVS will accept accept the eight-character (yyyy/ddd) form for ex- piration dates before 1998, in 1998 and 1999, and into the 21st cen- tury. To specify expiration dates before 1998 or in the 21st century, simply specify EXPDT=yyyy/ddd. To specify an expiration date in 1998 and 1999, you must add a TMNOKEY DD DUMMY statement to your JCL. With the TMNOKEY DD state- ment, MVS will interpret the expiration date as a real day in 1998 or 1999. If you omit the TMNOKEY DD statement, then MVS will inter- pret the expiration date as a special retention criterion. Syntax examples both of MVS JCL and of MVS tape utility control statements follow this article. MVS TAPE UTILITIES UCCBINQ, UCCGRW, and TIQ: The batch programs UCCBINQ and UCCGRW, along with the interactive program TIQ, will display real dates in yyyy/ddd format. These programs also will display special retention conditions with the keywords PERMANENT, LDATE/nnn, CYCLE/nnn, and CATALOG. Because the date display fields will be wider than before, you may have to change your UCCGRW control statements to format your report on a page. UCCUPDATE: The UCCUPDTE program will accept EXPDT=yyddd or EXPDT=yyyy/ddd to represent real dates. It will require a keyword PERMANENT, CATALOG, LDATE/nnn or CYCLE/ccc to represent special retention conditions. Finally, it will accept the keyword EXPDT=TODAY. TAPELIST: The TAPELIST utility will display expiration dates in five-digit format. It will mark dates that represent special retention conditions with a special character. DATA FIELD NAME CHANGES For the UCCGRW and UCCUPDTE programs, several data field names will change. The CRTDT field will become the CDATE field. This field specifies the date the tape was created. The STPNAME field will be- come the CSTEP field. This field specifies the name of the job step that created the tape. For only the UCCGRW program, the PD data type will become the DT data type for all date fields. The utility programs will continue to accept the current field type and names, but you should migrate to the new field names when possible. The new TMS manuals will document the new types. Also, the old types may not work in future releases. You should update your UCCGRW jobs which include type PD DEFINEs to type DT. You also should change your UCCUPDTE and UCCGRW jobs which refer to CRTDT/STPNAME to CDATE/CSTEP. SUMMARY OF REQUIRED CHANGES SYSTEM CHANGES REQUIRED MVS You must change your UCCGRW control statements only if your current reports will become too wide because of longer date fields. MVS You must change your UCCUPDTE EXPDT control statements if you modify expiration dates to keyword dates. SUMMARY OF CHANGES REQUIRED TO USE EXPIRATION DATES AFTER 1997 SYSTEM MAKE CHANGES TO VM/CMS VMTAPE MOUNT command MVS JCL FOR MORE INFORMATION UTCC has updated its documentation to reflect the TMS upgrade. The following UTCC publications document the use of the TMS. 1. Introduction to the Tape Mounting System, U01-0509, describes how to check out tapes, the TMS ABEND codes, the TAPELIST utility, and password protection. 2. Tape Management Batch Utilites, U01-0527, describes the UCCGRW, UCCBINQ, and UCCUPDTE utilities. 3. VMTAPE, U01-0578, describes how to use tapes on VM/CMS. You can print UTCC publications with the prtdoc command on VM/CMS and UNIX. MVS JCL EXAMPLES Mount a tape and keep permanently, using eight-character date. //TAPE DD DSN=J999998.MYDSN,DISP=(NEW,CATLG), // UNIT=TAPE, // LABEL=EXPDT=1999/365 Mount a tape and keep permanently, using five-digit date. //TAPE DD DSN=J999998.MYDSN,DISP=(NEW CATLG), // UNIT=TAPE // LABEL=EXPDT=99365 Mount a tape and keep until December 31, 1999. The TMNOKEY DD statement says you mean real date, not special retention. //TMNOKEY DD DUMMY //TAPE DD DSN=J999998.MYDSN,DISP=(NEW CATLG), // UNIT=TAPE // LABEL=EXPDT=99365 Mount a tape and keep until January 5, 2001. //TAPE DD DSN=J999998.MYDSN,DISP=(NEW CATLG), // UNIT=TAPE // LABEL=EXPDT=2001/005 Mount a tape and keep until January 5, 1998. The TMNOKEY DD statement says you mean real date, not special retention. //TMNOKEY DD DUMMY //TAPE DD DSN=J999998.MYDSN, // DISP=(NEW CATLG), UNIT=TAPE, // LABEL=EXPDT=1998/005 Mount a tape and keep until five days after it is last used. Absence of a TMNOKEY DD says date is a special retention condition, not a real date. //TAPE DD DSN=J999998.MYDSN,DISP=(NEW,CATLG), // UNIT=TAPE // LABEL=EXPDT=1998/005 MVS UTILITIES EXAMPLES Change a tape to expire January 5, 1998, with batch program UCCUPDTE. VOL=012345 VER DSN=J999998.MYDSN REP EXPDT=1998/005 Change a tape to expire five days after last use with batch program UCCUDPTE. VOL=012345 VER DSN=J999998.MYDSN REP EXPDT=LDATE/005