Understanding configuration and options files

Configuration and options files set the conditions and boundaries under which your session runs.

You, an administrator, or an end user can set option values to:

Set up the connection to a server
Control which objects are sent to the server and the management class to which they are associated

You define options in one or two files when you install the API on your workstation.

On UNIX and Linux® operating systems, the options reside in two options files:

dsm.opt - the client options file
dsm.sys - the client system options file

On other operating systems, the client options file (dsm.opt) contains all of the options.

Restriction: The API does not support the following backup-archive client options:

autofsrename
changingretries
domain
eventlogging
groups
subdir
users
virtualmountpoint

You also can specify options on the dsmInitEx function call. Use the option string parameter or the API configuration file parameter.

The same option can derive from more than one configuration source. When this happens, the source with the highest priority takes precedence. Table 1 lists the priority sequence.

Table 1. Configuration sources in order of decreasing priority
Priority	UNIX and Linux	Windows	Description
1	dsm.sys file (client system options)	not applicable	This file contains options that a system administrator sets only for UNIX and Linux. Tip: If your dsm.sys file contains server stanzas, ensure that the passwordaccess option specifies the same value (either prompt or generate) in each of the stanzas.
2	Option string (client options)	Option string (all options)	One of these options takes effect when it is passed as a parameter to a dsmInitEx call. The list can contain client options such as compressalways, servername (UNIX and Linux only), or tcpserveraddr (non-UNIX). With the API option string, an application client can make changes to the option values in the API configuration file and the client options file. For example, your application might query the end user if compression is required. Depending on the user responses, you can construct an API option string with this option and pass it into the call to dsmInitEx. For information about the API option string format, see dsmInitEx. You also can set this parameter to NULL. This indicates that there is no API option string for this session.
3	API configuration file (client options)	API configuration file (all options)	The values that you set in the API configuration file override the values that you set in the client options file. Set up the options in the API configuration file with values that are appropriate in the IBM Spectrum Protect session for the user. The values take effect when the API configuration file name is passed as a parameter in the dsmInitEx call. You also can set this parameter to NULL. This indicates that there is no API configuration file for this session.
4	dsm.opt file (client options)	dsm.opt file (all options)	On UNIX and Linux operating systems the dsm.opt file contains the user options only. On other operating systems, the dsm.opt file contains all options. To override the options in these files, follow the methods that are described in this table.