System Programmer Reference › Backing Up Data › Backup Job Overview › Quiescing Minidisks and File Spaces

Quiescing Minidisks and File Spaces

You can request that CA VM:Backup quiesce a minidisk or file space during a backup. You should quiesce when:

• The minidisk is changing constantly and you want to ensure a good backup.
• The file space contains files that must be maintained at the same commit level.
• The file space contains update-in-place files. All BFS files are update-in-place.
• The minidisk is a system minidisk for another product.

You can quiesce a minidisk or file space by requesting it on the Managing Exception File screen for the job or by specifying QUIESCE YES on the OPTIONS record in the TPI exception file for the job. For more information, see "Specifying Special Processing Options" in the Administration Guide or "OPTIONS Record" for backup job exception files in the OPTIONS Record.

If the quiesce user exit (VMBEXIT2) exists, CA VM:Backup uses it to send a quiesce request. CA VM:Backup uses the same exit to resume activity on the minidisk or file space that was quiesced. For detailed information about this user exit, see Quiesce (VMBEXIT2) User Exit.

If the quiesce user exit does not exist, CA VM:Backup issues a CP SMSG userid QUIESCE to ask the owning user ID to quiesce the minidisk or file space. If the user ID is not receiving SMSG, CA VM:Backup waits until the time specified for the user wait period (defined by the USERWAIT configuration file record) elapses, then assumes that the minidisk or file space is quiesced and continues the job. If the user ID receives the SMSG userid QUIESCE and does not respond within the allowed user wait time, CA VM:Backup assumes that the quiesce request has been rejected and the minidisk or file space is skipped.