We changed our largest VSAM files to EF and compressed them and
are very happy with the results. Make sure that your 3rd party software
supports EF -- we had to have maintenance on VSAMASSIST (Softworks).
A product I was trialing (VSAM MANAGER from Mainstar) does not
support EF. Those were the only ones we found, but I'm sure there are
others.

We were careful to only compress files that have a high read to write
ratio -- from what I've read, you can run into troubles if you have a
high number of writes and a low number of reads. So we decided to
be conservative and not press our luck!

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Fred Schmidt [SMTP:Fred.Schmidt AT DWNPLAZA.NCOM.NT.GOV DOT AU]
> Sent: Wednesday, April 01, 1998 10:38 PM
> To:   IBM-MAIN AT UA1VM.UA DOT EDU
> Subject:      Extended VSAM size & 59 ?!
>
>
>
>
>      Speaking of VSAM EF (extended format), I am thinking of
> converting 1
>      BIG ksds
>      used by our cics to EF & will appreciate any
>      problems/tips/.../to-compress-or-not you could share with
> me/LIST.
>
>      Thanks,
>      Reza
>      (If you want to post reply to me, please send to
> reza AT benbank.com DOT au
>      not my private Email, but I'll get it !)