Configuring Your Product › Customization Options › Customizing the CA Disk Tape Management Support › Method 2 — Controlling Tapes by Expiration Date

Method 2 — Controlling Tapes by Expiration Date

As distributed, CA Disk defaults to assigning expiration date of 99365 to all tapes, but does not catalog them. This technique is intended for those installations that do not have a tape management system. When CA Disk determines that all data on the tape has expired, it is released and made eligible as a scratch tape. This is the recommended method for controlling the CA Disk tapes.

Review if sysparm TAPEFSCR should be specified. CA 1 users should not specify it, but it is recommended for all other users.

To control tapes by a real expiration date, change the expiration date to be assigned using sysparm DYNEXPDT, described in the Systems Guide, or your JCL to specify a true expiration date. The value 99000 can be used to place the tapes under catalog control as described in Method 3.

By assigning a real date for expiration of the tape, there is a risk that the tape could be released before the data set records are expired so data could be lost.

You can choose to also catalog the tapes that are actually under expiration date control if it provides you with any additional benefit. Neither CA Disk nor CA 1 makes use of the catalog entry to locate tapes.

To have CA Disk catalog the tapes it creates, specify sysparm ARCTNAME with a value of C, rather than specify DISP=(NEW,CATLG) in the JCL. CA Disk generates a unique name for each tape it creates, and then catalogs it. You should also specify sysparm UNCATARC with a value of Y, to have CA Disk uncatalog each tape when it returns it to the scratch pool.

Note: For other applicable rules, see the section Assigning Tape Expiration Dates in the Systems Guide.