Performance Considerations

The Job Accounting Report System provides you with a number of options for managing and processing job accounting data. The summarization (or history file) feature is one of the options. The advantage of this feature is that once the basic input has been processed, a condensed file can be created and saved for future reporting. The summarization (or history file) feature enables the creation of a history file simultaneously with the production of a user-defined report. Up to 15 history files (one for each report) may be produced during one execution of CA JARS. These history files can serve to reduce the file to only those levels needed to meet specific reporting requirements. This feature can save considerable time in processing job accounting data and information.

The history file feature is designed to offer many benefits for user reporting:

• For many reports, a greatly reduced number of records is processed saving significant machine time.
• Since summary records are typically already sequenced for a given report, sort time is dramatically reduced.
• Summary records can be reprocessed to create yet smaller files.
• Processing time for one-time-only reports becomes insignificant.
• Use of the most detailed option of the history feature allows the retention of all detail contained in the raw data including any EXTDATA records.

History files can be created in each user-defined report by specifying history output on the SORT statement.

History files are divided into two categories:

• Detail: one record created for each job (level 6), or one record for each job and for each job step (level 7). When detail is specified, EXTDATA records are placed in the output file.
• Summary: one record created for the most detailed sort level defined on the SORT statement and requested as the history level (levels 1-5). At summary level, EXTDATA records are not retained.

This section contains the following topics:

History Records Compared to Account Records

Grouping

Retaining the Intermediate Account File