In 2008, U.S. Daylight Saving Time begins on March 9 and ends on November 2. Whether you change the time manually or have the system change the time automatically, the most important thing to keep in mind is that Robot/SCHEDULE must be inactive when the time change is made.

Two ways to set up the time change
Basically, there are two ways to accomplish the time change in Robot/SCHEDULE.

1. Create a CL program to end Robot/SCHEDULE, change the time, and restart Robot/SCHEDULE. (You can set up a Robot/SCHEDULE job to call this program.) This approach is explained in the Help/FACTS “Using Robot/SCHEDULE to automate Daylight Saving Time change.”

Note: You can modify the program to restart additional products so they pick up the time change. Products that benefit from this include: Robot/ALERT, Robot/AUTOTUNE, Robot/CLIENT, Robot/CONSOLE, Robot/MONITOR, Robot/NETWORK, and Robot/REPORTS.

2. Use the QTIMZON system value to make the change. With this approach, you need to create two Robot/SCHEDULE jobs to make Robot/SCHEDULE inactive during the time change. Download the Help/FACTS “Using Robot/SCHEDULE with the QTIMZON System Value” to get the details.

Important note: If you use the QTIMZON system value, IBM has issued the following Program Temporary Fixes (PTFs) that add updated time zone descriptions. After you apply the appropriate PTFs for your OS level, you can change the QTIMZON system value to the new value for your region. Continue to check with IBM in the event that future PTFs become available.

* i5/OS V5R4M0: PTFs SI26040 and SI25990

* i5/OS V5R3M0: PTFs SI26039 and SI25991

There are no changes for the QTIMZON system value in V6R1M0.

If your system uses a Hardware Management Console (HMC), you might need to apply additional fixes.

Unless specifically mentioned above, other Robot products are not affected by the time change. In addition, SEQUEL, ABSTRACT, ESEND, and EASY VIEW are not affected by the time change.

Contributed by Jeanne Thiesfeld, Technical Consultant

There’s an easy way to monitor Windows services from the System i

How long has the Windows print server been locked up? Why can’t we coordinate our System i backups with shutting down Windows services? Why didn’t we know the e-mail server was down?

If your System i operations team is saddled with the additional chore of monitoring Windows servers and batch processes, they’re not alone. It’s difficult enough to coordinate processes across a network of i5/OS systems, without adding multiple Windows servers. Unfortunately, most System i monitoring tools for Windows services don’t offer much help.

So, today you might have your network team monitoring these systems through freeware or through periodic manual checks. Do your operators wander through the server racks checking for unavailable services? Or, has your development team generously offered to write some code to help manage these issues?

Automate Windows service monitoring
Help/Systems has the simple solution: Robot/CLIENT. Robot/CLIENT can monitor Windows services with a command from the System i. The Monitor NT Service (RCLMONSVC) command (see Figure 1) can check for unavailable services, at regular intervals, from your most reliable server, the System i. When Robot/CLIENT detects a failed service, you can start a scheduled job, use the RCLSTRSVC command to restart it, react with another batch process, or send an e-mail to an operator.

Robot/CLIENT also has commands that let you start and end Windows services. These commands can release Windows services that have locked an i5/OS file, preventing a successful backup. All you need to do is start your backups with the command that ends Windows services (see Figure 2). When the backup completes, just restart the service using the start services command. Backups are just one example of when you might want to end a Windows service.

Let Robot/CLIENT go to work for you
As many of our customers have learned, Robot/CLIENT provides the tools necessary to maintain control of your network monitoring. It monitors and manages Windows services automatically, so you don’t have to worry about them. Let us help you automate Windows integration with the System i. Call for your Robot/CLIENT 30-day free trial. You won’t be disappointed.

Contributed by Tom Huntington, Vice President of Technical Services

We are interested in backing up report set definitions. If our primary server fails, we can reinstall Robot/REPORTS and restore the files we need to get started. What files in what libraries should we back up to restore in case of a disaster?
For disaster recovery purposes, back up the RBTREPLIB library. This library holds all of the setup information for Robot/REPORTS. If you are using disk for short-term archiving, you also should back up the REPSHTRMLB library. This library contains the short-term data. In a disaster recovery situation, you want to have this library so you can restore the reports that had gone to the short-term archive.

I want to move Robot/ALERT from one System i to another. Is there a way to save/export the current Robot/ALERT configuration, pager information, broadcast lists, and so on to the new system?
Yes, this is easy to do. End Robot/ALERT on the old system and save the RBTALRLIB library. Then, restore RBTALRLIB to the new system. You must delete and re-create the communication jobs on the new system.

In Robot/CONSOLE, what is the difference between running the command RBCCLNUP and running the history-purge program RBC596?
The RBC596 program cleans up Robot/CONSOLE history based on the age of a message and its severity level. It removes messages from monitored message queues.

The RBCCLNUP command cleans up dangling data queues left by users who do not run the RBCENDQ command.

How can I make sure Robot/SAVE regularly releases tapes to my scratch pool?
To release tapes to the scratch pool regularly, schedule the following command in Robot/SCHEDULE:
RBSPGMLIB/RBSRLSEXTP

How can I check to see if one or all my clients are running and ready to receive tasks from the System i?
You can poll each registered client using the Robot/CLIENT RCLPOLL command. The command determines if the Robot/CLIENT task processor is running and if the client is ready to receive tasks. The RCLPOLL command allows you to check the status of all attached clients at once or to enter up to 50 names of individual clients.

You can view the operational status of the clients on the Client Control Center panel.

To use the command interactively, enter it on a command line and press function key 4 to display the command prompt panel.

You also can schedule the command in Robot/SCHEDULE to poll each client on a regular schedule (such as hourly) or you can embed the command in a program.

How do I purge completed tasks in Robot/CLIENT?
The RCLCLEANUP command deletes completed tasks. You must specify the number of days of completed tasks you want to keep. The best way to keep completed tasks cleaned up is to set up a Robot/SCHEDULE job to run the RCLCLEANUP command to purge completed tasks on a regular basis.

Can Easy View help me find null values in my files?
Yes. When you are using the Scan feature in Easy View, the comparison value *NL finds null values in fields within your files. You can even use Extended Scan to replace the null values.

Can I use Robot/CLIENT to synchronize the time on different Windows servers?
Yes, if you have Robot/CLIENT on each server and Robot/SCHEDULE on your System i. Set up a command-type job in Robot/SCHEDULE that uses the RCLEXEC command. The task to execute is the Windows command to change the time. Schedule this task to run in Robot/SCHEDULE on the clients at the same time.

I recently upgraded to Robot/SAVE 11.0. I typically use the Restricted State Utility when I run a type 9 backup (backing up all objects). Now that I’ve implemented encryption, is there anything special I need to do when I sign on to the console and use the RBSRSURDY command?
Yes, Robot/SAVE needs to have the RBTROLLIB library added to its library list to handle encryption. We recommend attaching the job description RBSPGMLIB/RBSJOBD to the profile you use to run the RBSRSURDY command or you can run the following commands manually to make sure Robot/SAVE has access to the libraries it needs:

ADDLIBLE RBTROLLIB
ADDLIBLE RBTSDTALIB
ADDLIBLE RBSPGMLIB
ADDLIBLE QGPL