We are in the process of migrating from a single on campus data center to a pair of collocation facilities.
The on campus data center has a TSM 5.5.4.0 server running under SLES 9 Linux in a mainframe LPAR. Z/OS runs in another LPAR. The Linux system has the usual Linux file systems, file systems for the TSM database, and file systems for the TSM recovery log on ECKD disk. File systems for disk storage pools are on FCP disk. The Linux system has FCP tape drives. The z/OS system has FICON tape drives. The disks containing the usual Linux file systems are backed up to FICON tape by the z/OS system, using FDR. The DR plan for the on campus data center uses a SunGard hot site. The Linux system is recreated with FDR restores running under a z/OS floor system provided by SunGard. Once this is done, additional file systems are created and populated with empty database and recovery log volumes. The TSM database is restored to these volumes. The disk storage pools are not recreated. The first collocation facility has a TSM 6.6.2.0 server running under SLES 11 Linux in a mainframe LPAR. There is no z/OS system. All disk is FCP attached. The only tape drives currently available to Linux are the on campus FCP drives. FCP is layered on top of DWDM for the connection between data centers. The second collocation center, with a similar configuration, is expected to be available in a couple of months. We are not currently using z/VM, but we could do so if necessary; we have an unused license that was in effect bundled with the mainframe hardware. Originally, the interim DR plan for the first collocation facility (while we were waiting for the second collocation facility) was to avoid using the facility for systems that needed fast restores after a disaster. The long term plan was to recreate the destroyed TSM server as a second instance on the Linux system at the surviving collocation center. However, we have recently been asked to look into the possibility of recreating a Version 6 TSM server at the SunGard hot site after a disaster at one of the collocation centers. We have looked into the possibility of using a variant of the on campus data center DR plan, with CMS and DDR taking over the roles of z/OS and FDR. This appears to be economically unattractive, with a sizable capital expenditure and significant increases in network charges to provide for sending the DDR backups over FICON layered on top of DWDM. Thus far, potential DR plans based on the use of a Linux rescue system have been dismissed as too slow, too unreliable, and too hard to test. Does anyone know of a proven bare metal recovery process for mainframe Linux systems without FICON tape drives?