Odds and Ends
August 23, 2002 Timothy Prickett Morgan
Dear Readers:
Back by popular demand, here are more “Odds and Ends.” I hope you find something of interest.
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— Ted
Question:
Is there a command to get the source type of a source physical file member?
I’ve written an automated source backup/update program, and if I could get the type of source I could then determine which command to issue to create or compile the source.
Answer:
Try Retrieve Member Description (RTVMBRD). There’s a SRCTYPE parameter that will do the trick.
DCL VAR(&LIB) TYPE(*CHAR) LEN(10)
DCL VAR(&FILE) TYPE(*CHAR) LEN(10)
DCL VAR(&MEMBER) TYPE(*CHAR) LEN(10)
DCL VAR(&SRCTYPE) TYPE(*CHAR) LEN(10)
RTVMBRD FILE(&LIB/&FILE) MBR(&MEMBER) SRCTYPE(&SRCTYPE)
Question:
I have two files with the same record format, but different field names. Can I move one record into the other in RPG IV? That is, does RPG IV have anything like CL’s CPYF command with FMTOPT(*NOCHK)?
Answer:
You can’t reference the record names as fields in RPG IV. The ideal solution would be to use the Copy File (CPYF) command, but since that doesn’t fit in your case, here are two ways to handle the copy with RPG.
Here are two files with the same layout, but with different field names:
A* File PAYWORK A UNIQUE A R PAYREC A PWCLOCK 3P 0 A PWGROSS 7P 2 A PWMARSTAT 1 A PWNBRDEP 2P 0 A PWNBRPER 3P 0 A PWSTATETAX 7P 2 A PWLOCALTAX 7P 2 A K PWCLOCK A* File PAYHIST A UNIQUE A R HISTREC A PHCLOCK 3P 0 A PHGROSS 7P 2 A PHMARSTAT 1 A PHNBRDEP 2P 0 A PHNBRPER 3P 0 A PHSTATETAX 7P 2 A PHLOCALTAX 7P 2 A K PHCLOCK
Let’s say you want to copy a record in PAYWORK to PAYHIST.
One easy way is to rename the fields in the input file so that they have the same names as the corresponding fields in the output file:
Fpaywork if e k disk Fpayhist o e disk Ipayrec I pwclock phclock I pwgross phgross I pwmarstat phmarstat I pwnbrdep phnbrdep I pwnbrper phnbrper I pwstatetax phstatetax I pwlocaltax phlocaltax C read paywork C dow not %eof(paywork) C write histrec C read paywork C enddo C eval *inlr = *on
The other way is to use externally described data structures to give names to the record formats:
Fpaywork if e k disk Fpayhist o e disk D work e ds extname(paywork) D hist e ds extname(payhist) C read paywork C dow not %eof(paywork) C eval hist = work C write histrec C read paywork C enddo C eval *inlr = *on
Question:
I need to provide a way for our users to enter a free-format comment of a few hundred characters. If I create a single input field for the comment, the users can insert and delete text, but it looks bad.
Figure 1 |
If I use several input fields instead, the display looks much nicer, but insert and delete don’t work across lines.
Figure 2 |
Can you help?
Answer:
Define the comments field as one long field in the DDS. Use the Continued-entry field (CNTFLD) keyword to divide the field into more than one line. CNTFLD takes one parameter, which isthe number of characters to be displayed on each line.
The following DDS will generate the display you require. Notice that the 240-byte NOTES field is displayed on eight lines, thirty bytes per line.
A R REC A 4 3'Name:' A NAME 30 B 4 10 A 6 2'Title:' A TITLE 30 B 6 10 A 8 2'Notes:' A NOTES 240 B 8 10CNTFLD(30)
For this to work properly, you must use an enhanced workstation controller. I have had no trouble using this technique with a Client Access Express session.
Question:
Is this your full time job or just a hobby on the side? lol
Answer:
I just do this on the side. However, sometimes I spend so much time putting this newsletter together that it almost seems like a full-time job.
— Ted
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