>I tried 'dsmc q archive "/*" -desc="my description'  got nothing found

Welcome to the ranks of the frustrated, Jim.  The B/A client manual
doesn't describe the real techniques that need to be employed to make
some of the client commands yield expected results.
What we'd like to do is say "look for all my archive files, beginning
at the root of the mounted file systems".  But it doesn't want to comply.
What you have to do is restrict the search to a file system.
For example, if your file activity is in /home, you can do:
  dsmc q archive /home/ -subdir=yes -desc="whatever"
That should turn up all your files in that area.
Note the foolishness of these client commands: unless you code a
slash (/) or slash-asterisk (/*) at the end of the directory name,
the commands assume that you are looking for an individual *file*
of that name, and turns up nothing.  Aye, carumba!

   Richard Sims, BU