The backgrounds file contains data for each background process submitted for execution. The item-ID is a user specified string to uniquely identify the background job.
The attributes in the backgrounds file are:
| 00 | BACKGROUND | The item ID of the backgrounds file, user chosen. | |
| 01 | USER | The user that created this job. | |
| 02 | PORT | The port that created this job. | |
| 03 | MSG | Should a message be sent to the port that created the job when it ends. | |
| 04 | COMMAND | The command to run. | |
| 05 | TYPE | What the job is doing right now. | |
| 06 | ACTIVATE.DATE | The date that the job is to be activated. | |
| 07 | ACTIVATE.TIME | The time of day when the job is scheduled to be activated. | |
| 08 | SKIP.DAYS | Number of days to skip before the job is re-executed. | |
| 09 | SKIP.TIME | How much time to skip between re-executions. | |
| 10 | DOW | Days of the week to skip. | |
| 11 | INACTIVE.FROM | Time of day after which not to run this job. | |
| 12 | INACTIVE.TILL | Time of day before which not to run. | |
| 13 | CREATE.DATE | The date this job was created. | |
| 14 | CREATE.TIME | The time of day this job was created. | |
| 15 | START.DATE | The date the job last started. | |
| 16 | START.TIME | The last time of day this job was started. | |
| 17 | END.DATE | The date the job last ended. | |
| 18 | END.TIME | The last time of day this job ended. | |
| 20 | CNT | The job has been run this many times since it was created. | |
| 23 | ACTIVE.PORT | The port the job is running on right now. | |
| 24 | STATUS | The current status of the job | |
| C | Closed, Job has finish it’s schedule. | ||
| I | Initializing, Job is just being initialized. | ||
| Q | Queued, waiting until it’s next scheduled time to run. | ||
| R | Running, is currently being processed. | ||
| 25 | ACCT | The account to run the job in. | |
| 26 | STARTABLE | The state of whether the process will run again or not. | |
| ? | Calculating the time to run this process again | ||
| A | ASAP, run the job as soon as the bgsched is available. | ||
| N | Never run this job again. | ||
| T | Timed, waiting for the next time to run this job. | ||
| 27 | IMMEDIATE | Immediately reruns a recurring job, regardless of whether the previous job completed after the scheduled time for the next job. | |