Resolution:
Description:
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Is it possible to clone an Object Service Broker system at time "A" and then IPL the system at a later point in time, called "B", to do some quality assurance checks and then IPL back to time "A" again to run the system ? Will Object Service Broker object if we go back in time ?

Response:
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You can certainly clone Object Service Broker systems; however, updating the metastore or other segments at a later point in time "B" then reverting back to the time of the cloning "A" is not recommended. The main reason is that recovery of segments may be compromised by the timestamps contained within the updated pages of each segment. This is particularly true if you are using the "continuous backup" technique for recovery or restoring to a point in time and applying journal images of updated pages up to that point. In this case there will be timestamps in the pagestore chronologically ordered from time "A", then at a later time "B" and then more at time "A2" where A<A2<B.

If a recovery or continuous backup operation is attempted using the timestamps in the journalled pages, OSB will incorrectly process the page images since pages updated at time "B" will appear to be more current than those updated at time "A2". This will be chronologically incorrect and could result in physical or logical damage to the pagestore.

References:
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TIBCO® Object Service Broker for Open Systems Installing and Operating
TIBCO® Object Service Broker for Open Systems Managing Backup and Recovery
TIBCO® Object Service Broker for z/OS Installing and Operating
TIBCO® Object Service Broker for z/OS Managing Backup and Recovery

History:
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June 30, 2011. -Issued.
July 14, 2011. -Formatting of < characters corrected.