Hi, I'm looking for information about a command called savstg, but it seems that it no longer exists in 7.4.0. What was its replacement? Or does that function simply no longer exist? Regards.

Dear Miguel

There is no replacement for SAVSTG which does the backup sector by sector as opposed to object by object.  In my entire IBM i career, I have never known of anyone who ever used this command and I suspect its withdrawal is due to its utmost unpopularity.  

------------------------------
Satid S
------------------------------

Hello,

There were some limitations when it comes to restore if we use SAVSTG to save the system in the first place so i think that is the reason IBM did remove this function and it is no longer supported. It was existing until 7.1.0 and they removed it in 7.2.0.  There is no alternative , however if you are looking just to save the system you can always use IBM Native save commands or BRMS control groups.

Decades ago I knew one person who used this command.  He was from a LUG company who used this to spin up new machines.  The thing is, each machine had to be physically exactly alike down to the last card and card placement.  A restore done this way can mess you up otherwise as it also restores the SRM which stands for System Resource something or other.  You will see in the Backup and Recovery manual that you get prompted if you are restoring to a different machine for just exactly that item.  You do NOT want to restore that on unlike hardware.

Uninformed people were probably using SAVSTG not knowing of such things and IBM may have removed it to stop you from shooting yourself in the foot.

The closest thing we have currently is Flash Copy.

------------------------------
Robert Berendt IBMChampion
Business Systems Analyst, Lead
Dekko
Fort Wayne
------------------------------

Miguel - In 30 years on this platform, I have never had a need to use that command. Just curious here... since that command was removed when 7.2 came out, are you still on a 7.1 or older system or did you stumble across that command in some document or brms related book you read ?  Also,  is there a "problem" you are trying to solve by exploring the use of this command or is your question just more of curiosity in general. ?