<snip> I appreciate your offer for a suggestion. Our intention is to keep the latest three backup versions around for 70 days after the dataset gets deleted (after 35 days). Perhaps your suggestion will shed some light on my misunderstanding of the documentation. </snip>
I suggest: Expire after Days Non-usage . : 35 Expire after Date/Days . . . . : 35 Retention Limit . . . . . . . : 35 Partial Release . . . . . . : YES Migration Attributes Primary Days Non-usage . : 3 Level 1 Days Date/Days . : 5 Command or Auto Migrate . : COMMAND Backup Attributes, Backup frequency . . . . . . . . . . . : 0 Number of backup versions . . . . . . . : 3 (Data Set Exists), ---------------------> Number of backup versions . . . . . . . : 1 (was 2) (Data Set Deleted), Retain days only backup version . . . . : 70 (Data Set Deleted), Retain days extra backup versions . . . : 35 Admin or User Command Backup . . . . . : BOTH Auto Backup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : YES Since the dataset is created and not modified ("The datasets don't change, .....") there is most likely only 1 backup version of the dataset. The original dataset is deleted after 35 days. The backup should be deleted 105 days after creation. (70 + 35). What you seem to have coded above, is for the dataset to be replaced on a weekly(?) basis. Is this correct? This can change things significantly. In order to thoroughly understand this issue, I would create a test management class with (e.g.) 2 days as the retention period and monitor. HTH, <snip> thanks for the quick response. Either I'm not understanding you or something is missing from my initial post. The datasets don't change, there is no guaranteed backup frequency, and the one and only backup disappears, not to be replaced by anything. At that time, the LBACKUP changes to zero. I appreciate your offer for a suggestion. Our intention is to keep the latest three backup versions around for 70 days after the dataset gets deleted (after 35 days). Perhaps your suggestion will shed some light on my misunderstanding of the documentation. Thanks, also for the patch, but I'd rather get the backups working as intended. </snip> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN