1-Secure access

An uncontrolled use of this tool may result in some unrecoverable dataloss. Because of this, DATAWIPER utility implements the following access restrictions:

1. Access to the utility objects is restricted to class *SECOFR user profiles
2. Libraries containing files elegible for data wiping must be documented in file DATAWIPLCL/WIPEDLIBS, that can be done with a DFU.
   Library DATAWIPLCL is created at utility installation time. It contains local data that are maintained when installing subsequent releases of this utility.
3. Libraries with a name starting by letter Q cannot be accessed by the utility.

2-Command WIPEFILES

This is the command you may use for data wiping.
Make sure to proceed as follow:

1. Save your data files to some offline media
2. Use command WIPEFILES to wipe your data files
3. Delete your data files

                    Wipe physical database files (WIPEFILES)

 Type choices, press Enter.
                                                    
 Physical database file . . . . . FILE                  Name, generic*, *ALL         
   Library  . . . . . . . . . . .                       Name                         
 Member . . . . . . . . . . . . . MBR     *ALL          Name, generic*, *FIRST, *ALL 
 Remove database references . . . RMVDBF  *YES          *YES, *NO                    
 Status messages  . . . . . . . . STSMSG  *YES          *YES, *NO       
                

• Physical data base file (FILE) - Physical file(s) to be wiped. Enter one of the following:
  • the name of a single file existing in the given library
  • a generic file name for one or multiple files in the given library
  • *ALL to indicate all the the physical files of a given library
• Member (MBR) - Member (MBR) - Member(s) to be wiped (this parameter applies to all the physical files to be processed). Enter one of the following:
  • A single member name
  • A generic member name
  • *ALL to process all physical file members
• Remove database references (RMVDBR) - When a physical file has some logical files referencing it and some of these logical files have unique keys, some records of the physical file may reject the overwriting of their key values, and as a result the physical file may be just partially wiped.
  In such a case you may need to delete the referencing logical files before the wiping process starts.
  You can do that by specifying RMMVDBR(*YES).
• Status messages (STSMSG) - Whether status messages should be displayed if the job is an interactive one. Status messages provide information on the progress of the job.
  Note: Log messages are in any case provided at the end of the process and provide information about all the wiped files.

3-The wiping process

The purpose of the wiping process is to replace record fields data with some useless bit pattern. This is done in the following way:

1. Non-key fields are filled in with binary zeroes
2. Non-unique key fields are also filled in with binary zeros
3. Unique key fields are filled in with ascending or descending values.

• The following data types are supported for unique key fields:
  • A - Character data
  • B - Binary data
  • L - Date data
  • P - Packed Decimal data
  • S - Zoned Decimal data
  • T - Time data
  • Z - Time stamp data
• The following data types are not supported for unique key fields
  • F - Floating Point data
  • H - Hexadecimal data
  • J - DBCS-Only data
  • O - DBCS-Open data
  • G - DBCS-Graphic data
  • 5 - Binary Character data.