When you move a VSAM data set and the REPLACE or REPLACEUNCONDITIONAL keywords are not specified, you must specify DELETE, RENAMEUNCONDITIONAL, or RECATALOG (to a catalog different from the source catalog). If the REPLACE or REPLACEUNCONDITIONAL keyword is specified and a preallocated target is not found, DELETE, RENAMEUNCONDITIONAL, or RECATALOG must be specified for the data set to be processed.

For VSAM data sets cataloged in an integrated catalog facility catalog that will be copied using the IDCAMS utility, a preallocated target data set will be renamed using a DFSMSdss-generated temporary name. This allows dynamic allocation and IDCAMS REPRO to work, because both are currently undirected in catalog usage.

VSAM data sets cataloged in an integrated catalog facility catalog with alternate index and path associations do not use a preallocated target if the DELETE keyword is specified. No search is made for existing data sets in this case. An integrated catalog facility alternate index cannot use a preallocated target. No search is made for existing data sets when copying an alternate index.

For VSAM components that are larger than one cylinder, DFSMSdss will recognize only an integral number of cylinders of free space on a target volume. Also, the required space for a VSAM data set must be contiguous.

You can move the base cluster, all associated alternate index clusters, and paths by using the SPHERE keyword with the COPY command.