Search390.com Expert Question of the Week May 21, 2001 Welcome to Search390's Expert Question of the Week newsletter. Remember, no question is too simple for Ask the Experts! If you have a 390-related question, send it to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Selected questions will be answered by our experts. This week's question was answered by Jim Keohane, search390's Web Integration and Troubleshooting S/390 Expert. ===================================== GET THE INFO YOU WANT TODAY What do YOU want in your e-mailbox? How about FREE info and offers about computers, networking, wireless devices, finance and lots more? Visit http://search390.techtarget.com/postmasterDirect/, choose the topics that interest you, and you'll get the e-mail you want. ===================================== Q: Every time I log on to TSO, I'd like to be asked two questions: 1. Do you wish to submit your daily jobs? 2. Do you want to touch your favorite data sets? Here is what they would do: 1) Would submit a batch job to run on the mainframe or it could execute an online REXX routine that compares PDS members to see if there have been any updates since the last run. 2) This only does one thing-- it goes out and opens and closes a data set. This saves archiving on critical files but is infrequently used. I know the last one will bug dasd management, but sometimes there are valid reasons for exceptions to the rule. I know these things are possible because other shops I have worked in do them. A: There are a few problems. The only way to check whether a PDS member has been updated is by examing the "CHANGED" date from the ISPF STATS for that member as seen when viewing the PDS directory in ISPF Browse/Edit. That field is updated by ISPFEDIT when a SAVE of the member is done. However, that field is wiped out when the member is updated or changed via COPY, REPRO, IEBGENER, etc. FTP will also clear that field under most cases. I'll assume your shop can count on the CHANGED dates being present and accurate. As for "touch" I believe you mean something analogous to touch command on unix or pc that doesn't change the contents of a file but sets the file's date and time to the current date and time. Right? An MVS dataset has its "last referenced date" updated whenever the dataset is edited, rewritten, modified or even just read/browsed. That means you can "touch" an MVS dataset just by reading it or even by just opening dataset for input and then closing it. IEBGENER with //SYSUT1 pointing to dataset to be touched and //SYSUT2 as DD DUMMY will work. Unfortunately, the above touch won't work for members. An MVS member's CREATED and CHANGED dates are unchanged when member is just read/viewed. To touch a member you can do an FTP LOOPBACK (to same host you are on), set BLOCK MODE, set EBCDIC and then PUT member to temp in same PDS, delete original member and rename temp to original name. Kinda chancy. Make sure you specify EXIT for FTP so that, if PUT fails due to insufficent space, the delete and rename are skipped. Not recommended. I would suggest you visit http://www.cbttape.org where you can download some very useful utilities. There's a PDS85 in FILE 182 that can do almost anything with a PDS. There's OFFLOAD, PDSLOAD, LISTPDS, etc. that provide for ISPF STATS. Visit http://www.open-softech.com for REXXTools product that allows access of ISPF fields for a member as well as a means (STOWM) to update those fields. You can "touch" members with this tool. If you investigate BPAM macros (FIND, STOW, BLDL, etc.) you can roll your own assembler code to do the touching. I would not be surprised to see there such a utility already exists on the CBT TAPE. ================================ LIVE IN OUR DISCUSSION FORUMS ================================ Join Jim Keohane this Thurs, May 24, in search390's discussion forums. 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