General Information for TASKTYPE

The job scheduling definition can belong to one of three basic types of tasks:

• Job
• Started Task
• Warning Message

Jobs and started tasks can be "normal", that is, submitted or activated once, or cyclic. Furthermore, it is possible to define emergency versions of jobs and started tasks (normal and/or cyclic).

The three basic types of tasks are indicated by the TASKTYPE values described in Table 222:

Table 222 TASKTYPE Basic Type Values

Jobs and Started Tasks

A regular job is submitted to the JES input queue for execution; it then waits in the queue like any job submitted under the operating system.

After the job finishes executing, Control-M analyzes the results and determines what actions to take. The job is not submitted again unless the RERUN statement is performed. For additional information, see MAXRERUN: Post–Processing Parameter.

Started tasks differ from jobs in that they are not submitted to the queue; instead, they are invoked by an operator START command issued by Control-M. For details on passing parameters to started tasks, see MEMLIB: General Job Parameter.

Note: PREVENT-NCT2=Y cannot be specified for started tasks (STCs).

A cyclic job or a cyclic started task is recycled for additional possible executions after Control-M has analyzed its execution results. The job or started task executes again only after the number of minutes specified in the INTERVAL parameter has passed since the last execution and the rest of its runtime scheduling criteria have been satisfied.

Note: BMC recommends that a cyclic job delete the prerequisite conditions that triggered its operation. Otherwise the job might continually be resubmitted.

If a cyclic job is executing at the time the New Day procedure is run, and the value of the job’s MAXWAIT parameter has expired, the New Day procedure changes the job to a non-cyclic job and handles the job accordingly.

Use of the cyclic option precludes the use of RERUNMEM and DO RERUN parameters.

Emergency Jobs and Started Tasks

Note: Emergency jobs and started tasks are supported for backward compatibility, but BMC recommends redefining them as regular jobs and started tasks that are activated by DO FORCEJOB statements. Control-M/Restart users can also use a DO IFRERUN statement. The DO FORCEJOB statement is described in DO FORCEJOB: Post–Processing Parameter, and the DO IFRERUN statement in §Restart§DO IFRERUN: Post–Processing Parameter.

An emergency job or emergency started task can be used to overcome any irregularities in normal execution. The job remains in the Active Jobs file, waiting to be scheduled, until all regular jobs of the same SMART Table finish executing OK and are checked by Control-M. Then, when the emergency job is no longer needed, the job is automatically removed from the Active Jobs file. For additional information, see MAXWAIT: Basic Scheduling Parameter.

Note: BMC recommends that the GROUP parameter be specified if you define emergency jobs. If it is not specified, the job may stay indefinitely in the Active Jobs file.

Emergency jobs can be filtered out of the job display in the Active Environment screen and filtered out of reports.

Warning Messages

Note: The IOANOTE utility, which is described in the INCONTROL for z/OS Utilities Guide, can also be used to issue warning messages. BMC recommends that the IOANOTE utility be used in place of this tasktype wherever possible.

For tasktype WRN, warning messages are sent to the IOA Log file when the job is ordered. The messages are taken from the member specified in the MEMNAME parameter.

Note: A job defined with tasktype WRN is not placed in the Active Jobs file.