Title: app-backup/tsm changes to scheduled backups
Author: Nowa Ammerlaan <nowa@gentoo.org>
Posted: 2025-09-24
Revision: 1
News-Item-Format: 2.0
Display-If-Installed: >=app-backup/tsm-8.1.27.0

In version 8.1.27.0 some changes were made to the way the init
service scripts for systemd and openrc are distributed by
app-backup/tsm. As a result some user intervention may be required.


What changed?
====================

Gentoo now uses the init service scripts distributed by IBM as part
of the DSM client rpm packages. Previously we used custom versions,
which came with a number of drawbacks. Notably, in some configurations
certain files could be skipped by the backup client during a scheduled
backup operation [1].

To avoid such issues in the future it was decided to avoid straying
too far from how upstream intends for this software to be used. A side
effect of this is that the "dsmc" service script was removed, and only
the (upstream) "dsmcad" service script remains. This affects both
systemd and openrc.

The DSM Client Acceptor Daemon (dsmcad) is a more lightweight and
modern alternative to continuously running a "dsmc sched" process. It
can be configured to manage scheduled backup operations as well as the
webclient [4].

Note that the localisation option of the dsmcad service is
configurable in /etc/tivoli/dsmcad.lang. Users may change this
setting, but please note that IBM recommends using a single-byte
character set (such as en_US) in order to ensure successful backups of
all files regardless of the character set used in the filename [1].
Users who are certain that there systems do not mix filename character
sets may wish to configure dsmcad to match this character set to
ensure that log files and restore operations display the filenames
correctly.


User Action Required (systemd)
====================

Users who are using the DSM backup client with systemd and
'dsmc.service' to perform scheduled backups, should migrate to the
more modern "dsmcad.service".

# Verify the status of dsmc
systemctl status dsmc

If it is enabled, then first configure dsmcad to run the scheduler in
your /etc/tivoli/dsm.sys file [4]. For example:

# nano /etc/tivoli/dsm.sys
Servername <MY-SERVER>
	<snip>
	ManagedServices  SCHEDULE
	<snip>

# Then, disable dsmc and enable dsmcad
systemctl disable --now dsmc
systemctl enable --now dsmcad

Note that a side-effect of this change is that the output of the
scheduled backup is no longer written into the systemd journal.
Instead the output of the acceptor daemon, as well as the scheduled
backup operations that it runs, can be found in /var/log/tsm/. Thus
additional adjustments to monitoring scripts may be required.


User Action Required (OpenRC)
====================

Users who are using the DSM backup client on OpenRC systems and are
currently using '/etc/init.d/dsmc' to perform scheduled backups should
migrate to the more modern '/etc/init.d/dsmcad'.

# Verify the status of dsmc
rc-update show

If it is enabled, then first configure dsmcad to run the scheduler in
your /etc/tivoli/dsm.sys file [4]. For example:

# nano /etc/tivoli/dsm.sys
Servername <MY-SERVER>
	<snip>
	ManagedServices  SCHEDULE
	<snip>

# Then, disable dsmc and enable dsmcad
rc-update stop dsmc default
rc-update del dsmc default
rc-update start dsmcad default
rc-update add dsmcad default


Questions or issues?
====================

As usual, please report any issues you find in the 8.1.27.0 version on
bugs.gentoo.org. And feel free to contact the author of this news item
on IRC (Nowa) should you have any further questions.


Further information
====================

For further information, please read the following documentation
pages:

[1] https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/storage-protect/8.1.27?topic=solaris-set-language-environment-variables
[2] https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/storage-protect/8.1.27?topic=spso-setting-client-scheduler-process-run-as-background-task-start-automatically-startup
[3] https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/storage-protect/8.1.27?topic=problems-starting-stopping-client-service
[4] https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/storage-protect/8.1.27?topic=reference-managedservices
[5] https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/storage-protect/8.1.27?topic=cs-comparison-between-client-acceptor-managed-services-traditional-scheduler-services