More years ago than I want to remember (ok ok mid 80's to mid 90's) I
was a CICS sysprog in an MVS mainframe shop.  Now somewhere about CICS'
21st birthday the developers decided that the old assembler code had
become unmaintainable and so to improve reliability they re-specified it
using something called Z language (from memory... and strange that it
was never heard of again if it was so good), and recoded it from
scratch.  This then became a reliable platform upon which enhancements
could be built.

TSM is about that old now.  I assume that  it was translated from
assembler to C about the time it began to be supported on multiple
platforms, and now with V6 and DB2 there is a database back end that
will allow significant DB changes with little  development cost.

So, lets assume that TSM is to be redeveloped - as-is in V 7.1 but
providing significant improvements in 7.2.

While still retaining the basic flavour of TSM, - progressive
incremental backups, storage pools, copypools - what features and
capabilities would you like to see?

Me?

On the server I'd like :
Migrate Inactive on primary storage pools.
A scratch pool concept so that TSM never lost track of a tape or its
last use, and its tape stats.
Better tape library integration - maybe an abstract library that is
mapped onto a real library
Instant creation of weekly/monthly/yearly incremental backups from the
current state of a node, by means of a logical operation on the DB, with
no new copying required.
Intelligent application of sql in commands eg cancel sess where
session_number in (select session_number from sessions where
session_type='NORMAL')
More intelligent script and macro languages.  I'd really like to see
something like Ruby embedded for this purpose.

On the Client
Ability to manipulate API objects from a command/line and gui interface
Ability to backup/restore via stdin/stdout
Subfile backup to be extended to work on huge files.
API interfaces to perl/python/TCL and supplied SWIG files for binding
other languages
Fully functional Admin API with the same interfaces as the backup API
Encouragement from IBM for third parties to develop backup interfaces
for niche/obscure databases such as Reality-X, Cache, Firebird and other
applications not well suited to file level backup eg Cyrus mailserver.
Maybe a directory of user contribs in the client distribution.
API to permit intelligent client/or server level incrementals. eg RMAN
sends entire DB, TSM sends and stores only the changed blocks.

What would you line to see?

Regards

Steve

Steven Harris
TSM Admin, Sydney, Australia