Defining Segments, Files, and Areas › Segments, Files, and Areas › Files

Files

Database Files Contain Data

A CA IDMS database is stored on one or more disk files on direct access volumes. Database files contain data CA IDMS/DB accesses on behalf of applications.

What a File Defines

The definition of a file includes:

• The name of the file being defined. Within a DMCL, the name of the file must be a unique combination of the segment with which the file is associated and the file identifier.
• The type of file (that is, database or native VSAM) and the access method CA IDMS/DB is to use.
• Optionally, the data set name (or other operating system specific information) that CA IDMS/DB can use to locate the file rather than using information specified in a JCL statement.
• The external name or label in z/VSE to be used to identify the file. CA IDMS/DB searches the execution JCL for an external file name that matches the specified name and, if found, uses the JCL information to locate the dataset. If you do not specify information about the dataset in the FILE statement, you must include an external file name.

Example

create file emp_demo1
  assign to empfile;

Note: For more information about file access methods and creating files, see Chapter 17, “Allocating and Formatting Files”.