Control Statement Format

Control statements for FDR components consist of 80-character logical records (“card images”) where:

Columns 1 to 71

Contain the command, operands, and comments fields, except when continued to subsequent logical records.

Column 72

Must be blank if the last character of the command or operand is in column 71.

Column 73 to 80

Not used by FDR; may contain an identification or sequence number.

General format

For almost all FDR programs, the general format of control statements is:

Command Operand Comments

where:

Command field

The COMMAND field identifies the control statement. Each FDR program has a set of commands it accepts, as documented in the rest of this manual. The command can start in column 1 of the input record, or it can optionally be preceded by any number of blank columns, as long as it ends before column 72. The command cannot be continued to another input record. It must be followed by at least one blank column.

Operand field

The OPERAND field, if present, follows the command field and is separated from it by at least one blank. The operand field consists of one or more operands, separated by commas (a common mistake is separating the operands by blanks instead of commas, causing the extra operands to be taken as comments). The operand field may not contain embedded blanks except within quoted strings. Operand fields may be continued onto subsequent logical input records but the first operand must appear on the same record as the command (For more information, see Continuing an Operand Field.).

Almost all FDR commands require operands. The operands accepted with each command are documented in the rest of this manual.

Almost all operands are keywords, meaning that multiple operands may appear in any order. In a few cases, the operands must appear in a specific order, and are documented under the specific command.

Comments field

The comments field, if present, follows the operand field and is separated by one or more blank columns. The comments field may contain any characters; it is not validated. The comments field may not be continued, that is, they must end at or before column 71. Comments are not permitted on a control statement that allows operands but on which no operands have been specified.

You can also specify an entire record of comments by placing an asterisk (*) in column 1 of an input record. You can use the rest of the record for comments.

Sub-operand

Some operands consist of a list of sub-operands. A sub-operand list must be enclosed within parentheses, unless the list reduces to a single sub-operand, in that case the parentheses may be omitted.

Quoted strings

When the variable data you specify for a parameter contains certain “Special Characters” you must enclose the data with apostrophes. This is called a “quoted string”. Within a quoted string, all characters, including blanks, may appear. If an apostrophe is to be part of the string, it must be coded as two apostrophes. Quoted strings are accepted only where the documentation for an operand indicates so.

Special characters

Parentheses, commas, equal signs, apostrophes, and blanks.

Continuing an operand field

When the total length of the operands on a statement exceeds the available columns in a logical record, they must be continued onto one or more following logical records.

To continue a statement, interrupt the operand field after any complete operand or sub-operand, including the comma that follows it. That comma must be occur at or before column 71 and the next column must be blank. On the next input record, start the next operand anywhere in the record (columns 1 to 71).

You may continue the control statement any number of times. Some users put only one operand per record to improve readability.

Sample control statements

Here are some examples of properly formatted control statements, including continuation and comments:

Column 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
....+....0....+....0....+....0....+....0....+....0....+....0....+....0....+....0 DUMP TYPE=FDR RESTORE TYPE=DSF,DATA=USED RESTORE DATA SETS DUMP TYPE=APPL, Application Backup
ARCHBACKUP=NO, Do not backup control file
PRINT=DSF List selected data sets * THE FOLLOWING IS A RESTORE STATEMENT - THIS IS A COMMENT
RESTORE TYPE=ARC,
RECAT=YES * The following illustrates continuing a sub-operand
SELECT DSN=SYS1.PARMLIB,NEWNAME=TEMP.PARMLIB,NVOL=(TEMP01,
TEMP02,TEMP03)

Notation

Each subsection of this manual that describes a control statement starts with a table showing the command and operands for that command, followed by detailed descriptions of the operands. In that table, the following notation is used in this manual to define the usage of each operand:

Uppercase letters and words must be coded exactly as shown.
Lowercase italicized letters and words represent variables that you must substitute specific information as defined in the detailed descriptions.
When an operand has several values, the values are separated by a vertical bar (|). You must choose one of the values. For example, RECALL=YES|NO means that you can code RECALL=YES or RECALL=NO.
When a particular value is the default for an operand, it is indicated by a double underline. For example, DATA=ALL|USED indicates that DATA=USED is the default. However, for some operands, the default that is distributed with FDR can be changed by the installation by setting options in the FDR Global Options.
When an operand has a short form, the short form of the operand is shown with a single underline. For example, SIMULATE indicated that SIM is a valid abbreviation for SIMULATE.
Some operands cannot appear together on a given statement. These and other restrictions are given in the detailed operand descriptions.

Tip

We recommend that you specify all relevant options on each control statement, rather than depending on the setting in FDR Global Options. This ensures proper execution of your job even if the option table is changed or reset, and helps BMC Support diagnose problems in your FDR jobs.