Acquire File Naming Convention
The //AVMDATA file
A USS (UNIX System Services) file system
Both of these places
If writing data to USS, files with names of the following form will be created:
<yyyymmddhhmmss>_asz<s><tttttttt>_.<nnnn>
- or if USSCOMP=Y is in effect -
<yyyymmddhhmmss>_ezz<s><tttttttt>_.<nnnn>
where <yyyymmddhhmmss> is the time of the first data record processed by the Acquire run
<s> is the data source (v=z/VM MONITOR data, y=Velocity Software data)
<tttttttt> is the target number associated with this system
<nnnn> is a number that reflects the version of Acquire, e.g., 1010, although any valid number is permissible
Files written to USS have the target number embedded in their name, in what is a standard Syncsort™ Capacity Management naming convention, and in 5001 or 7001 records.
The //AVMDATA file contains the relevant target number(s) in 5001 or 7001 records.
If you use the //AVMDATA output file, you must transmit the data to where Control Center can locate it, and rename it to match the definition for that system in System Manager. The advantage of the USS option is that files are created with the correct naming convention, and if connectivity is permissible, this data can be automatically retrieved by Control Center.
The file created by Acquire will compress very well if you have access to a compression tool such as PKMVS (which is compatible with the PC tools WINZIP and PKUNZIP). You can compress the data before transmission, then use WINZIP or PKUNZIP on the PC to return it to its original size, but this is an entirely manual process that you must manage yourself.
Data must be transmitted in such a way that the uncompressed text is converted to ASCII on the Windows system that is running the Control Center. Normally you achieve this by specifying the ‘ascii’ command within FTP to ensure that the mainframe EBCDIC data is correctly translated.
Do not use binary transmission of uncompressed data when copying from the mainframe to a Windows environment.
Conversely, do use binary transmission if you copy compressed mainframe data to a Windows environment, for example if you set USSCOMP=Y in Acquire.
If you have a z/OS based compression tool and you compress text data yourself and send it on Control Center, you must do so as a binary transmission, and name the eventual file that Control Center processes in a way that indicates it is compressed EBCDIC data, not compressed ASCII data, that is, like this:
<yyyymmddhhmmss>_ezz<s><tttttttt>.<nnnn>
The ez in the name is what instructs Control Center to decompress the data then convert it from EBCDIC to ASCII.