Welcome
Running CICS® VR forward recovery
CICS® VR forward recovery consists of a restore and then forward recovery.
Entering recovery parameters
Before the recovery job is created, you have the option to change the CICS® VR parameters that are used in the recovery job creation. You can define the following CICS VR parameters for your forward recovery job.
Defining the VSAM buffer pools
Use the CICS® VR VSAM buffer pools secondary window to tune your CICS VR run by changing the number of buffers in the VSAM buffer pools.

What's new in CICS VR 6.3
CICS® VR 6.3 contains these changes.
Operating environment
CICS® VR uses logs to recover your VSAM data.
CICS VR Overview
Getting Started
CICS® VR and CICS® TS
CICS VR Exits
Running CICS® VR forward recovery
CICS® VR forward recovery consists of a restore and then forward recovery.
- Creating and running a forward recovery task
  When you create and run a forward recovery task you can select the specific VSAM spheres or data sets that you want to forward recover. You can edit the CICS® VR recovery parameters and product a test report.
- Specifying criteria for the VSAM sphere list
  How to filter the VSAM spheres that are displayed on the CICS® VR VSAM sphere list by specifying a VSAM sphere and Data set.
- Selecting from the VSAM sphere list
  After you enter search criteria or the name of a data set on the CICS® VR VSAM sphere list secondary window, the CICS VR VSAM sphere list panel is displayed. The spheres listed either match the search criteria that you entered or are listed in the data set that you specified.
- Entering recovery parameters
  Before the recovery job is created, you have the option to change the CICS® VR parameters that are used in the recovery job creation. You can define the following CICS VR parameters for your forward recovery job.
  - Applying entered parameters
    CICS® VR attempts to apply the entered default recovery parameters to each of the VSAM spheres that you selected in preparation for the construction of the recovery job. If CICS VR finds any errors during this process, a separate message is written to the data set allocated to the DWWMSG ddname for each error.
  - Defining the VSAM buffer pools
    Use the CICS® VR VSAM buffer pools secondary window to tune your CICS VR run by changing the number of buffers in the VSAM buffer pools.
  - Defining exits
    Use the CICS® VR exits secondary window to define which CICS VR exits you want to use in this recovery run.
  - Choosing selective recovery
    If you select the Selective forward recovery option from the CICS® VR forward recovery secondary window the CICS VR selective recovery secondary window is displayed.
  - Preventing duplicate recovery runs
    You can prevent a Forward Recovery job from running, if it is a duplicate of a previously run job.
- Specifying the log stream type
  Use the CICS® VR log stream type secondary window to select the type of log stream, MVS™ log stream or QSAM copy of the MVS log stream, that you want CICS VR to use during construction of the recovery job.
- Listing recovery job errors
  If CICS® VR detects errors while constructing the recovery job, the CICS VR recovery job error list secondary window is displayed. Use the CICS VR recovery job error list secondary window to obtain information about errors found during the construction of the recovery job.
- Submitting the job
  After the recovery job has been constructed, the CICS® VR job submission secondary window is displayed. Use this secondary window to submit, browse, or edit the job.
- Recovery construction from batch
  To run full recovery for selected VSAM spheres, you can use the DWWBRC00 sample job in the SDWWCNTL data set. Recovery includes CICS® VR recovery job construction, restoration of VSAM spheres from registered backups, and CICS VR forward recovery.
Running CICS® VR backup
The information in the following topics describe how to take a backup using CICS® VR. The panels and secondary windows are in the sequence that they are displayed during a backup job generation.
Running CICS® VR reorganization
You can reorganize a VSAM sphere using CICS® VR. VSAM sphere reorganization can increase the space of a sphere and its alternate indexes. It can also change the control interval sizes for a sphere's components.
Working with other VSAM sphere list pull-down menus
The CICS® VR recovery and backup functions are typically accessed using the Utilities pull-down menu after selecting VSAM spheres.
Working with CICS® Backout Failed spheres
The CICS® Backout Failed sphere list shows the CICS spheres registered for manual recovery or reorganization after CICS notification of a backout failure.
Working with logs
Using ISMF data set lists with CICS® VR
CICS® VR is integrated with ISMF so that you can create a CICS VR recovery job for the data sets in an ISMF data set list by entering the VSAMREC line operator or list command. When you enter the VSAMREC line operator or list command, the necessary CICS VR panels are called and you can create a recovery job for the VSAM sphere.
Running CICS® VR manually
IBM® recommends that you use the CICS® VR panel interface to create recovery jobs for your VSAM spheres. Using the CICS VR panel interface eliminates the need for you to manually keep track of daily update activity, logs, backups, etc. Also, the CICS VR panel interface automatically creates the recovery JCL for you.
Running CICS® VR batch backout
The CICS® VR batch backout utility allows you to remove updates that were made to KSDS, ESDS, RRDS, and VRRDS VSAM spheres by steps in a batch job. This section describes how to run the CICS VR batch backout utility.
Understanding CICS® VR reports
The CICS® VR forward recovery and batch backout utilities produce a set of reports upon successful completion. The reports are written to the data set allocated to the DWWPRINT ddname. However, the set of reports written for the forward recovery backout utilities differ from the set of reports written for the batch backout utilities.
Understanding IBM® program support
The IBM® Customer Engineering Program Support structure helps you resolve problems with IBM products, and ensures that you can make the best use of your IBM computing systems.
Problem determination procedures
If you have to contact IBM® personnel about a CICS® VR problem, you must classify and describe the problem.
Diagnosing the causes of abends
You can determine the cause of a CICS® VR abend in a number of ways.
Reference information
The reference sections of the information contain reference information that you need when you use CICS® VR.
Glossary
The terms in this glossary are defined as they pertain to the CICS VSAM Recovery documentation.
Edition notice
This is the information for CICS VSAM Recovery for z/OS. It applies to CICS VSAM Recovery for z/OS Version 6.3, and to all subsequent versions, releases, and modifications until otherwise indicated in new editions. Make sure you are using the correct edition for the level of the product.
Download PDF
Download the PDF format documentation for CICS VSAM Recovery for z/OS 6.3

Defining the VSAM buffer pools

Use the CICS® VR VSAM buffer pools secondary window to tune your CICS® VR run by changing the number of buffers in the VSAM buffer pools.

If you selected VSAM buffer pools from the CICS® VR forward recovery secondary window, shown in Entering recovery parameters, the CICS® VR VSAM buffer pools secondary window is displayed.

Figure 1. VSAM buffer pools secondary window

                          CICSVR VSAM buffer pools         Row 1 to 10 of 11

 For LSR, enable or disable Automatic LSR buffers.  If disable, specify the
 number of LSR buffers or leave all fields blank for NSR.  Then press Enter.

   Automatic LSR buffers ===> YES

   Number of buffers   Pool size
   ________            B512
   ________            B1K
   ________            B2K
   ________            B4K
   ________            B8K
   ________            B12K
   ________            B16K
   ________            B20K
   ________            B24K
   ________            B28K

 Command ===> __________________________________________________________________
  F1=Help     F5=GetDef   F6=SaveDef   F7=Bkwd     F8=Fwd     F10=AutoNO    
 F11=AutoYES F12=Cancel

When you first enter this secondary window, the CICS® VR default values are displayed. Press F5 to obtain the default values from the RCDS. Press F6 to save the currently displayed values; the CICS® VR Default update verification secondary window opens. Press F10 if you do not want to use the automatic calculation of LSR buffers option; press F11 to use this option.

Recommendation: For more efficient recovery jobs, use automatic LSR buffers. For more detailed information about automatic LSR buffers, see BLDVRP: Build the VSAM resource poolCICS® VR Implementation Guide and Reference.

For detailed help information about any of these fields, move the cursor to the field and press F1.