A problem has been identified: "I've got what I need, I see the problem in our FTP server code. What triggers the problem (and why it shows up intermittanlty) is that the one particualr client issues the append command to our FTP server and our server than attempts to open the data connection back to the client (in order to start receiving the data to be appended), and that open sometimes times out. This leaves our server hanging in the middle of append processing on the control connection from that client until a timer pops and we attempt to clean things up. There is some suspect code in the cleanup processing that I believe was put there in order to allow null files in SFS, but it is misinterpreting this situation as a case where we want a null file to be stored. I will take this up with the FTP code owner tomorrow and I am sure I will be taking an APAR to get this problem fixed." The APAR opened is PK59054, in case you re interested. I said "a problem", not "the problem" because the source of the timeout has yet to be identified. It is undoubtedly external to VM and is what uncovered the FTP server problem. Thanks to Joe Hust and everyone who helped with this. Regards, Richard Schuh
