topic Re: Enhancements in Operating System - OpenVMS

Enhancements

vmsserbo — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 11:31:25 GMT

Currently our PRINT/PURGE BACKUP LOG menu option isnâ t very good. It does what it says, but you never know whatâ s in the backup.log as you donâ t know when it was last cleaned out.
First, change it to VIEW/PRINT BACKUP LOG FILE. (ADDM0700.com)

Have it ask first â [D]etail or [S]ummary report?

If detail, we want to pull the backup information from the backup.log and backup.sav;* files in prod_admin. If they want a summary report, we should pull from the Stats_Dir:AutoStat*.* files.

It should then ask â [C]urrent, 30 day, or 60 day â this is how many days back from today they want to see the backup times for. I would give them the option of going to the Screen or Printer with the resulting output.

Where things get a little dicey is that you never know at a given time how far back the current Autostat and Backup.log files go back â so the search may have to read the first line of those current files to see if we have to also go to the Autostat backup files / backup.sav files to get all the information requested. We need to pull the DETAIL report from the *_backups.out file in [central] as opposed to the backup.log file.

I donâ t want the option to clean out the BACKUP.LOG file anymore.

Enclosed I have the actually com file I need to modify to accomplish these tasks. Can someone help me out with this?

Thanks!

Re: Enhancements

Allan Bowman — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 11:44:28 GMT

Miles,

For some reason I cannot open your attachment so I can't see what you are starting from - you mention a "com" file, so I am assuming you provided DCL code.

Is your intent to have someone rewrite the procedure for you? Or are you looking for help in modifying some part of it? If you could be more specific as to what specific areas you need help with, it would make it easier to suggest a solution.

Is there anyone else at your company who could help? If not, maybe it is time to attend some OpenVMS training classes (or even just DCL). There are a number of classes available online.

Allan in Atlanta

Re: Enhancements

Allan Bowman — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 11:53:03 GMT

Try this:

Go to http://dcl.openvms.org/

and click on the "Training" link in the column on the left.

You will get links to three companies that offer OpenVMS training. I believe all three have DCL classes and at least two offer on-line training.

Allan

Re: Enhancements

vmsserbo — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 11:56:20 GMT

Yes, can someone rewrite this for me!

Here is the com file again

Re: Enhancements

Allan Bowman — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 12:48:36 GMT

Ok, I can read it now (may have been a problem on my end).

If you are truly looking for someone to rewrite the procedure for you, I would suggest finding out from your company how much they are willing to pay for consulting services. You can't expect forum participants to repeatedly do your job for you without some form of compensation.

It's one thing to ask for help on how to do a specific task - it is totally different when you are asking us to do your work for you.

I'm sure there are many of us here in the forums who would welcome the opportunity to do OpenVMS consulting with your company - possibly even some in-house training would be in order.

Allan in Atlanta

Re: Enhancements

vmsserbo — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 12:53:39 GMT

Re: Enhancements

Robert Brooks_1 — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 13:25:23 GMT

Isn't it just adding a few simple dcl commands to the procedure. What's the big deal! Don't help me then! Why is it all about money? Why not help each other if you can? I admit am not that knowledgable with DCL.

---

Who said it's all about money? You received a couple of replies suggesting that you get some training.

While people here tend to enjoy sharing their knowledge, there is much less interest in doing your job, which is pretty much what this request is about.

Why don't you read some of the documentation that's part of the VMS doc set? A few hours reading about DCL will enable you to complete this task.

-- Rob

Re: Enhancements

vmsserbo — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 13:29:57 GMT

I will. Can someone at least get me started on what the dcl command is to use the ask?

Thanks!

Re: Enhancements

Hein van den Heuvel — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 13:49:14 GMT

The way to ask a question is already in the example: READ/PROMPT

You then probably want to use the LEXICAL function F$LOC to help recognize the answer, or ask for the ugly "1 for x, 2 for y" :-(.

For unknown date ranges you can use

$days = 30 !or 0, or 60, or...
$loop:
$file = F$SEARCH (some-wildcard-spec)
$IF file .EQS. "" then goto next_step
$file_date = F$CVTIME(F$FILE(filename,"CDT"))
:
$list_date = f$cvtime("0:0:0 -'days'-")
$IF file_date .GES. file_date
$THEN
:

But please read the books: VMS doc, or the 'writing programs in dcl'.
And check the examples
- in your application.
- in sys$startup

We can all tell you need help seeing silly stuff in the sample.
- Enabling/Requiring BYPASS for a PRINT? Yikes!
- Mucking with type-ahead? Yikes
- Looking in one place "x.y" and using from an potentialy other place "sys$login:x.y"? Yikes!

And yes, I'm one of those lurkers whcih for some money will gladly teach you over the phone or onsite!

Hein van den Heuvel
HvdH Performance Consulting.

Re: Enhancements

Jan van den Ende — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 14:21:11 GMT

Miles,

Even those of us that will create DCL procedures more than once or twice for any participant (and specifically Hein is known to have done so A LOT - without belittling others) there still are some loose ends in your question that prevent serious help.

- @DCL_SCREEN
is DCL_SCREEN a logical name (if so, what does it equate to?), or some command procedure? In the latter case, in which directory? It must be the current default, but how did it become that?

- F$SEARCH("BACKUP.LOG")
more or less the same question, but more strict: search is performed in the current default directory (LNM does not apply for filespecs containing a "." )
- WHY then the need of extra priv? If it is the SYS$LOGIN (home dir) of the user running this, he would have access anyway (but maybe needs to change protection); if it is NOT, then how got the default get set? It is not in your code snippet!

In short:
Insufficient info.
And i _DO_ (most heartily) with the various "yikes" by Hein!

... Maybe if you asked advice about the choices available to make some changes, you stand a better chance of getting helpfull assistence (or more precise questions).

We ARE (very) willing to help, but help YOU to do your work, and not do it all for you!

Proost.

Have one on me.

jpe

Re: Enhancements

Robert Gezelter — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 14:34:05 GMT

Miles,

I concur with the sentiments of my colleages, re-writing complete projects is properly a consulting/training matter, and several of us earn our livelihood in that manner. By all means, you can contact us offline.

That said, there are many resources available to you:
- the OpenVMS Documentation Set available (in both HTML and PDF) from http://www.hp.com/go/openvms
- the online HELP text, particularly the HELP text for the lexical functions
- the examples on http://www.OpenVMS.org
- the session notes from various presentations that several of us have made at one technical symposium or another. My sessions can be found at http://www.rlgsc.com/presentations.html (one of these days, I will get the spare time to write the program to cross reference presentations by keywords, but I would not recommending waiting for that).
- there are probably one or two books that have been written on the subject, some may be out of print, and only available on the used market (try http://www.alibris.com )

There is no substitute for taking a simple example and working it. Gradually expand it one step at a time, using new facilities and features. This is one of the best ways to learn this material.

I hope that the above is helpful.

- Bob Gezelter, http://www.rlgsc.com
-