Re: Purging data from General Ledger files?

>  From:    bob.young@givaudan.com
>  
>  As our GXR file is approaching 3 gig and we've only been on BPCS 18 
>  months, our system administrator is asking what can be done to reduce this 
>  size of this.
>  
>  SSA Product Knowledge FAQ says "There is no reference material available 
>  as there are no programs to purge data from the CEA General Ledger files."
>  
>  Does anyone have any experience with this or know a third party 
>  application that would purge or archive general ledger data?

Bob

I am not familiar with the GXR file - this may be something on BPCS version 
other than what I work with.

I would have your System Administrator take a look at BPCS_L archives & 
search for discussion of REORG & also look to see what OSG has to say about 
that topic.

http://archive.midrange.com/bpcs-l/index.htm

When we discovered SYS120 & what it does & why it needs to be run regularly, 
we were outraged ... millions upon millions of deleted records were not going 
away ... further discussion as to why the BPCS files are setup that way led 
us to the conclusion that they SHOULD be that way, but BPCS System 
Administrators NEED to know about this REORG stuff so we can get rid of 
unwanted records through normal cyles of fiscal & weeks.

Then after resolving what you can with the REORG functions, to get rid of 
records that in BPCS eyes are DEAD, the next thing you need to address, as a 
company, is how long you really need to keep various kinds of records ON LINE.

Note that SYS120 does NOT get rid of 100% of BPCS DEAD records ... there are 
a handful of files for which you will have to use the operating system 
functions to get rid of records soft coded for deletion.

Is your need for certain kinds of records that are 10 years old, for example, 
such that it would be acceptable to store them on magnetic tape, perhaps with 
a backup of the tape as insurance against media going bad, so that when an 
occasion arises that someone needs to access a record from 10 years ago, they 
do not have to have that information at the computer's finger tips.

You will probably need to reach a compromise between people who need access 
to ancient records for whatever reasons, and a reasonableness of corporate 
budget to pay for the disk space to store that & the powerful computer 
subsystems needed to provide rapid access to today's data after wading 
through billions of records that are years old.

There are various places in SYS800 & elsewhere that set how long you need to 
keep records.  BPCS_L would be a good place to ask about the reasonableness 
of how long to keep stuff.  For example, we discovered that if we purge ITH & 
FLT for shop orders that are currently open, those orders can no longer be 
closed "normally."

We recently closed a facility.  This means we have millions of records in 
each of countless files that will eventually need to go away.  I have been 
writing some programs to get rid of stuff that we no longer want or need, 
starting with customer orders which in BPCS 405 CD are stored to infinity 
even when 100% shipped.

MacWheel99@aol.com (Alister Wm Macintyre) (Al Mac)
AS/400 Data Manager & Programmer for BPCS 405 CD Rel-02 mixed mode (twinax 
interactive & batch) @ http://www.cen-elec.com Central Industries of 
Indiana--->Quality manufacturer of wire harnesses and electrical 
sub-assemblies - fax # 812-424-6838

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