How a long-term plan is created

HCL Workload Automation for Z examines every application and job description. If an application is a member of a group, HCL Workload Automation for Z extracts the run cycle and calendar information from the group definition.

When the planning process finds a valid run cycle, it checks for generated dates within the long-term plan range. The planning process must check the defined calendar to determine if the free-day rule should be applied. For details, see Selecting a free-day rule. HCL Workload Automation for Z also checks the workday end time on the calendar; the next day does not start until that time is reached. For example, if you specified a work-day end time of 06:00 hours, a free day following a work day would not start for HCL Workload Automation for Z purposes until 06:00. This means that work might be scheduled on a free day. For more information, see Creating the default calendar.

HCL Workload Automation for Z ignores multiple occurrences that fall on the same day with the same input arrival time because of the free-day rule. It schedules only one occurrence and writes a warning message to EQQMLOG.

HCL Workload Automation for Z creates an occurrence in the long-term plan for each required instance of the application or job description. Application occurrences that are part of an occurrence group are uniquely identified by a reference to the group definition and by a common input arrival date and time.

HCL Workload Automation for Z detects and reports a duplicate occurrence, but does not store it in the long-term plan. This can happen when the run cycles for an application specify that an occurrence should be generated every Friday and also on the last day of the month. In this example, when the last day of the month is also a Friday, only one occurrence of the application is stored in the LTP; the other occurrence is canceled because it is a duplicate.

When the planning process creates an occurrence, the operations are examined. If an operation has one or more external predecessors, the planning process tries to make the dependency in the long-term plan. The dependency links the closest occurrence, that is, the occurrence with an equal or the nearest earlier input arrival time. If a predecessor application occurrence does not exist in the LTP, no dependency is created. In this case, the planning process issues a message to indicate a potential problem.

An application occurrence is not included to the long-term plan through the batch job if the generated instance origin date is earlier than the LTP start day or later than the LTP end date. This applies even when there is a rule shift that would make the occurrence IA be included in the long-term plan.