How Span Works

The Span accessory provides host-based replication of a DMSII database. Use Span to create data files that contain copies of DMSII database records. This approach is useful when a network is not available for a DATABridge server-client relationship or when a DATABridge Client does not exist for a particular client system.

When Span requests updates for data sets that have not been cloned, the DATABridge Engine (DBEngine) initiates a routine to extract all of the records for the uncloned data sets from the DMSII database. DBEngine returns these records to Span as if they were newly-created records. DBEngine also forwards any additional changes that occurred to these records during the extraction. (This extraction may include duplicate records or other anomalies.)

There are three phases when using Span:

• Phase 1—Run Span to generate a Span parameter file for the database to be replicated.

• Phase 2—Run Span to replicate the database.

• Phase 3—Run Span to update the replicated database based on changes in the audit file since the initial replication or since the previous update.