Creating scheduled tasks

You can schedule tasks for Copy Services Manager.

1. Log in to the Copy Services Manager GUI as a user with administrator privileges.
2. Click Settings > Scheduled Tasks.
3. Click Create Task. The Scheduled Task wizard is displayed.
   1. Type a name for the scheduled task in the Task Name field.
   2. Optional: You can enter a Description for the scheduled task.
   3. You can also set the option to Create a PE package if error occurs running the task.
      Tip: The information in a PE package can be helpful when troubleshooting.
   4. Click Next.
4. On the next page of the wizard, select whether you want the task to run Hourly or Daily/Weekly. You can also select No schedule if you do not want the task to run on a set schedule.
   Notes:

   • The task does not start running on the schedule until it is enabled.
   • If you select No schedule, you cannot enable the task because it does not have a schedule. You can run the task manually, but you must set a schedule to enable it.
   
   • If you select Hourly, indicate how often (for example, every 3 hours). The task is scheduled to start at the top of the hour at the selected interval.
     Note: The hourly scheduling is set by dividing a 24-hour day into the number of intervals that you want. For example, if wanted to run the task every 3 hours, that would equal eight times per day. In this example, starting at midnight, the day is divided into eight intervals.

     If you require a specific time of the day for the task to start, use the Daily/Weekly schedule.

   • If you select Daily/Weekly, select which day or days of the week, and a Time of day to start.
     Note: The start time is based on the browser, which uses the local system time. The Copy Services Manager server might not be located in the same time zone as the browser. Keep this fact in mind when you select the Time option.
   1. Click Next.
5. Click Add Action.
6. On the next page of the wizard, make the following selections:
   1. Choose the action Type from one of the following options:

      Command

      Runs a selected command on the selected session at the selected time interval. You select the command and session in a later step.

      Wait For State

      Waits until the selected session reaches a specified state before the next action is performed. You select the state and session in a later step.

   2. From the table, select the session for which you want to schedule the action. Only sessions for which the selected action can be performed are displayed.
      Note: Currently, you can only schedule an action against one session at a time.
      
      The following information is provided about each session that you can choose from for scheduling a task:

      Name

      The session name.

      Type

      Indicates the type of session.

      You can customize the session list by filtering information, resizing columns, reordering columns, sorting rows, and hiding columns. All changes that you make to the sorting, column sizing, column order, and table filters persist for each user on a browser across logins.

      • To filter the list by session name or type, enter the filter text in the Filter field. You can enter complete text or partial text. To remove the filtering for the list, click the X icon in the Filter field.
      • To resize a column, drag the column heading border until the column is at the width that you want.
      • To sort the rows in the list, click the heading for the column that contains the value that you want to use for sorting. For example, if you want to sort by the session type, click the Type heading. The list sorts by the value in that column. You can choose an ascending or descending sort order by clicking the column heading.
      • To reorder columns, left click and drag a column from the current location in the table to the new preferred location.
      • To hide columns or make columns visible, right-click on the table header. This action gives you a list of possible columns for the table. Or you can left-click on the icon in the upper right of the table header. Clear the check from any column to hide it from the table. Check any column to make it visible in the table.
   3. For Command and Wait For State actions, you need to make more selections.
      For a Command action:
      • Select the command that you want to issue.
        Note: The commands that are available depend on the type of session that you select.
      For the Wait for State action:
      • Select which state to wait for before the next action is performed.
        Note: The states that are available depend on the type of session that you select.
      • Select a time, in minutes, to wait before the action times out.
      Note: If the command fails, or the state is not reached before the timeout time that you selected, the entire task fails and no other actions run.
   4. Click OK to save your changes for the scheduled task action, or click Cancel to exit without saving changes.
7. Repeat steps 5 and 6 for every action that you want to perform in the scheduled task.
   Example:

   You might have two sessions: a Global Mirror Failover/Failback (GM) session and a Metro Mirror Failover/Failback (MM) session. In this example, the MM session is running in Global Copy mode and is cascaded off the GM session's Global Copy target volumes to a third site. You might want to periodically schedule a set of actions so that the targets of the MM session that is running in GC mode get a consistent image.

   You can schedule this set of actions as follows:

   1. Create a new task.
   2. Choose a schedule when the task runs (such as daily at midnight).
   3. Add a Command action that issues a Suspend command to the GM session. This action suspends the GM session consistently if the DS8000 supports Pause with Consistency.
   4. Add a Wait for State action that waits until the GM session is in a Suspended state.
   5. Add a Command action that issues a Suspend command to the MM session.
   6. Add a Wait for State action that waits until the MM session is in a Suspended state.
   7. Add a Command action that issues a Start H1->H2 command to the GM session. This command restarts the GM session so that replication is running again to the second site.
8. You can change the order in which the actions are performed by clicking Up or Down. You can also delete actions by selecting them from the table and clicking Remove Action. Or you can make changes to actions by clicking Modify Action.
9. On the next page, review the summary for the scheduled task actions. If everything is correct, click Finish. If you need to make changes, click Back to return to any pages in the wizard where changes need to be made.
10. If you click Finish, a message indicates whether the task was created successfully.