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Status Future consideration
Workspace z/OS
Categories DFSMS DSS
Created by Guest
Created on Jul 3, 2022

RELATED IDEAS

DFSMS - Total capacity required by DSS DUMP or COPY

Daily, we have a batch running to dump few datasets to flash volumes using ADRDSSU FR(REQ) while the datasets are closed by ONLINEs and later dump those data on flash volumes to Tape. The other day, we encountered flash volumes capacity wasnt sufficient as the source files sizes have been increased and we had to increase the capacity in flash volumes storage group.

Since we do not know how much capacity is needed, we tripled the size of flash pool. Am trying to see if a utility can be built that helps in calculating space required by a dump or copy job? is that something doable? Can this be incorporated in DSS or some other utility? DCOLLECT & REXX can be used but in ADRDSSU we use patterns with INCLUDE & EXCLUDE and this makes the code build complicated.

Generally, flash pools are limited in capacity. So, when a team runs their jobs, and if they can validate whether the capacity can fit into that pool, they can proceed to actual backup.. please let me know if you need more info

Idea priority High
  • Guest
    Reply
    |     Jul 29, 2022

    Forgot to add that the SELECTMULTI(ANY) keyword should be added to the DFDSS job using CHECKVTOC to cater for multi-volume datasets.

  • Guest
    Reply
    |     Jul 29, 2022

    This isn't a DFDSS issue it is a Storage Management issue. Without some idea of the number of datasets or GB, and how time constrained these backups are, i.e. how many GB to backup within what time period before online's come up, it's hard to offer solid solutions.

    Some things to consider:

    1. Why not backup direct to Tape in the first instance rather than to a Flash pool and then to Tape? Has it been tested to see what difference in timing that would make? With virtual tapes you might find direct to tape is fine.

    2. If you have a number of these backups which target the Flash pool and each backup can vary then you're always going to potentially have a problem with Flash pool sizing, especially if you have no control over what is included in the backups or the dataset sizes. And even if you develop a mechanism to calculate the space when do you do that, and how much time do you have to adjust the Flash pool space before the backups start? The best you can do is monitor the Flash pool over a reasonable period that includes peak processing periods and long holiday periods for example when it usage would be at its highest. Use that as a base point and add an extra 20-30% or so to cater for fluctuations.

    3. If the INCLUDE and EXCLUDE masks for ALL the backups can be brought together then these can be used as input to a process to calculate the overall space the datasets use. If you run a DFDSS job with PARM='TYPRUN=NORUN' mode and the CHECKVTOC keyword using the masks it will report each datasets extents and extent size, but it does need a STORGRP(sgname) or LIDY(volser). Or DCOLLECT and other numerous utilities (including OEM's such as CRplus or FDREPORT) can cope with the masking to get totals. The subsequent REXX post-processing can deal with anything they can't. From the space calculated you have some idea of the Flash pool requirement and if it's run at a time that allows capacity to be added/enabled before backups start that's fine. The total Storgrp capacity and freespace can be found using D SMS,STORGRP(sgname) or the Naviquest Storgrp report, or other OEM utilities. I assume the backups are being compressed with zEDC so depending on the number of datasets being compressed already then you could expect the backup sizes to be substantially smaller than the total of the datasets.

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