Environment
Situation
Resolution
1. Does load tsafs /enableGW=yes cause the GroupWise objects to show up in the tape backup software?
No. This alone does not cause the GW objects to show up as selectable objects in the tape software. Tsafsgw.nlm does that. This is more for convenience. It makes no difference to the backup whether the GW objects show up in the tape software or not.Customers were used to the way the old gwtsa.nlm made the objects show up so tsafsgw was modified to provide that option.The tsafs.nlm has code to backup the GW files without tsafsgw loadedso tsafsgw is not required, but can fix some locking problems. Tsafsgw is a wrapper that provided additional functionality. The major addition was to cache the GW database to diskrather than tape,as a copy so that tsafs.nlm could releaseitslock on the filesmuch sooner. Tsafsgw eliminated the problem of GWreturning8201 and 820e errors during the backup if GWtimed out waiting forthe file while the tsafs.nlm had it locked.
2. What is the role of tsafsgw.nlm in backing up GroupWise?
If unloaded, tsafs.nlm will still backup the GW databases. However the caching functionality of tsafsgw would be gone.This may causeGW to return the 8201 and 820e errorsif the tsafs still has the file locked after GW times out waiting.This usually happens with extremely large and busy GW databases that are constantly being updated. Tsafs has the code needed to backup GW. Tsafs does not require tsafsgw to do this. However, if you run into these GW errors, you might want to use tsafsgw to fix them. Tsafsgw.nlm requests the data from tsafs.nlm and makes a copy of it to disk. Tsafs then releases its lock on the GroupWise DBs. Tsafsgw then sends the data from this copy to the tape backup software. This enables the tsafs to release the lock on the DB databases much sooner, thus eliminating the 8201 and 820E errors returned by GroupWise if it times
3. What happens if I don't use the load tsafs/enableGW=yes switch?
If yes, the tsafs.nlm checks any file with a db ext to see if it's a GW file. If yes, then it toggles a bit so that no one can write to the file while it's being backed upwhile at the same time, tsafs uses a GW type of lock, rather than the hard lock that is normally used. Thisallows GW to still read its DB files while they're being backed up. This type of lock also allows the tsafs to backup the open GW files if GW has the file locked at the time of backup. However, any updates of new data to these files are prevented until the file is backed up.
if no, then tsafs.nlm treats the GW DBs as any other file. If the DB is open, tsafs.nlm skips it. If closed then tsafs locks the filewith a hard lock. If GW needs to access that file it can't because of thislock.All access, reads as well as writes is prevented until the file is backed up and the lock released. This can sometimes cause GW to return 8201 and 820e errors if the DB file is still locked by tsafs when GW tries to access the DB file. GW will retry to access the file for x number of tries. If the file is still locked at the end of the timeout, the errors are returned. The backup of the DB files to tape can take a long time to finish if the files are large enough. This can result in corruption of the GroupWise databases if one DB is updated while another is locked by tsafs.nlm while it's being backed up. The DB that's locked does not receive the update. It's best to use the /enableGW=yes switch when backing up GroupWise.
4. Does it matter if the GroupWise objects show up in the tape backup software as selectable objects?