Re: DataArea vs. Tables

I have two uses for data areas:

1) Store run time data for two applications. The two applications are slightly different, so each has a data area. Some items: remote system user name and pasword, telephone number (ancient, but works for these two applications). Also, a vendor supplied end of day processing program has a modification in it to populate the data area with a run date. That date is used to access a third system and download selected files, by date. Never thought to use a PF for this, and the end of day program is in CL, and is a whopper. Making that thing do anything that could cause it to hang at midnight is not good.

2) Due to HIPAA regulations, the vendor modified a program to not include data that was needed by a select few people. I added a data area, named same as program, that contains the prefixes of display stations that are allowed to see protected data. Those few people really did not like the change the vendor made, as the removed data was needed for them to do their jobs. That just didn't seem right to create the overhead of a PF for what amounts to 16 bytes that is read at the start of the program and not updated.

Vendor uses LOTS of data areas for different scratchpad activities.

John McKee

John McKee
-----Original message-----
From: Ken Sims mdrg8066@xxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Fri, 13 May 2011 16:10:39 -0500
To: midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: DataArea vs. Tables

Hi Birgitta -

On Fri, 13 May 2011 17:17:02 +0200, "Birgitta Hauser"
<Hauser@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I’m just curious, are you using data areas (heavily) or not?

In addition to things already mentioned by others, I use data areas
for locking functions. Unlike some objects, data areas support all
locking levels: *SHRRD, *SHRUPD, *SHRNUP, etc.

For example, I'll use a data area to make sure that there aren't two
instances of the same NEP job running simultaneously.

The job allocates the data area *EXCLRD (not *EXCL because that
interferes with backups).

If a second instance is started, it can't get the *EXCLRD lock and
exits.

(The submit process also tries to get the lock, then releases it.)

Ken
Opinions expressed are my own and do not necessarily represent the views
of my employer or anyone in their right mind.
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