Re: GDS on the iSeries?

"Wilt, Charles" <CWilt@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message 
news:mailman.949.1168606768.12056.midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Michael,

Not sure what you are talking about.  If you can explain what it is,
that would help.

Sorry about that. Generation data sets are like datasets that have a 
system-managed identifier as part of their physical name. You initially 
define the GDS to the OS, defining its attributes and how many "versions" 
the system should manage for you. If you define 3 versions, when you create 
a new one and there are already 3, version #1 (the oldest) will be 
automatically purged. When you want to access the GDS, you can explicitly 
specify a specific version (give me #23) , or you can say "last" (most 
recent) or "first" (oldest).

This can be a very handy mechanism when you need to keep up with "sets" of 
data from certain sources and you want to manage a certain number of files 
within each "set".

Does that make it any more clear? The IBM MVS system supports native GDS and 
it is very useful. VSE (what we run) unfortunately does not provide this; 
hence, they developed a "home grown" mechanism. It's not perfect, but it 
works.