Friday Fine-Tune: Print classes, STORE, FTP
December 2, 2016
I need to add classes to a printer on my HP 3000. I keep getting a message that the LDEV doesn't exist from SYSGEN's I/O section when I issue the ACLASS command. I can see the device exists, so what's the problem?
Devices on your system that are configured through NMMGR must have their classes changed through NMMGR, which is probably why you're getting the error message. Run NMMGR and go to the PROFILE for the device. You should be able to add classes to the device at that point. After making changes in NMMGR, remember to VALIDATE these changes to NMCONFIG, and then cross-validate using the RDCC command from SYSGEN's SYSFILE section.
NMMGR changes take effect after the system has been reSTARTed and the power has been cycled on the DTCs. You should cut a System Load Tape (SLT) making these changes so you'll have them on tape for your next UPDATE.
If your device was configured through SYSGEN, the device should have its classes modified through SYSGEN. You're right, you do use the ACLASS command in the IO section. Changes to the IO section require a START to make them take effect.
In HP's MPE/iX manuals I am are directed to backup the system as follows:
STORE @[email protected],@[email protected]@[email protected]@.SYS;*T;DIRECTORY;SHOW
What is the practical benefit over
STORE @[email protected]@;*T;DIRECTORY;SHOW
People trot out the reason from the distant past: if you have to do a re-install it is good to have PUB.SYS (and maybe the TELESUP account) on the front of the tape so you can restore quicker.
Gilles Schipper woke us up with his response. “The reason one would perform the former over the latter is to ensure that all of the files residing in the SYS account be placed at the beginning of the backup. Whether that is a good thing is, in my opinion, dubious."
If you have user volume sets you MUST explicitly list them after the DIRECTORY keyword or else the directories for the user volume sets will not be stored.
Is there a way to use FTP to move an IMAGE database between two HP 3000s?
FTP by itself won't work, as it doesn't support user-labels, which are included with the IMAGE root file. DSCOPY, while not being as trendy as FTP, does know about user labels. The Web has freeware LZW compressor programs which know how to archive IMAGE datasets, so you can use FTP without having to change the file codes to non-priv values beforehand. Just archive the sets into one non-priv package, FTP it as a binary file, and then use LZW to re-expand the data-sets back to their original form. LZW programs, along with many other open source gems, are available at SourceForge.