Method A - Maintaining Data Records with Utilities

A lot of data accumulates during daily operation of an AE system.

This includes:

Statistical records
Reports
Messages and data for the Revision Report and the Open Interface to Output Management Systems

One method to maintain the AE database is using the following utilities:

AE.DB Archive
AE.DB Reorg
AE.DB Unload

General Information

The utilities included in the maintenance procedure can be called in batch mode (see Start Parameters). Use this opportunity and create a workflow in your AE system, which carries out the individual steps on a regular basis (see example)! The particular settings need to be specified only once in the utility.

Note that system client 0000 should also be maintained! It can accumulate major amounts of data as it contains the log files of the servers and agents and other data.

Note that you must not backup the table DIVDB when you use a DB2 database and want to backup it manually before you run the reorganization process. The reason is that the reorganization process uses the table DIVDB running the statement

ALTER TABLE DIVDB ACTIVATE NOT LOGGED INITIALLY WITH EMPTY TABLE

and you can neither restore the backup data nor run the command ROLLFORWARD anymore.

To Maintain Data Records

Archive the messages, statistics and reports. Use the AE DB Archive utility for this purpose.

The generated files are clearly structured in folders organized by clients and archiving runs. As folder names also contain the corresponding dates, it is easier to locate particular data records.

Archived data can be viewed with the Archive Browser at any time. Set filters to limit the number of data records to be displayed depending on your requirements.
Reorganize the data records. Use the AE DB Reorg utility for this purpose.

Data records are marked with deletion markers in this step but are not yet deleted from the database!
Unload the data records. Call the utility AE DB Unload to finally erase the data records from the database. Use the option "Reorganize database". If necessary, this utility can also be used for resetting archive and reorganization flags.

Performance Improvement

The archiving, reorganizing and unloading processes can take some time if huge amounts of data are involved. The following tips can help to improve performance by accelerating the above processes:

When reorganizing, avoid using the option "Keep the last n statistics." By doing so, the utility AE DB Reorg does not count all statistical records of all objects but directly starts the reorganization process using the date as a basis.
Only reorganize reports if they should be reorganized before the statistical records. If this option is not activated, the utility AE DB Reorg reorganizes reports together with the statistical records.