5.23 VMFPLC2 (VM formatted tape utility)

5.23.1 Function

The VMFPLC2 utility is used to manipulate (create and read) VMFPLC2 (VM) formatted tape files for
VM/370 use. The utility requires a function (dump, scan, load) followed by the name(s) of the files to be
processed.

5.23.2 Syntax

Descriptive

VMFPLC2 {DUMP controlfile outputfile | SCAN
inputfile |

LOAD inputfile}

Diagram

Êʬ¬¬ VMFPLC2 ¬¬¬§¬¬¬ DUMP ¬¬¬ controlfile ¬¬¬ outputfile ¬¬¬§¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬ÊÍ

ª¬¬¬ SCAN ¬¬¬ inputfile ¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬«

LOAD ¬¬¬ inputfile ¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¯

5.23.3 Parameter

DUMP

The dump function is used to create a VMFPLC2 formatted tape.

SCAN

The scan function is used to list the contents of a VMFPLC2 formatted tape.

LOAD

The load function is used to import the contents of a VMFPLC2 formatted tape onto
the system.

controlfile

This specifies the name of a control file. The control file allows the dump function to
determine what files to dump and how they should be interpreted on VM.

outputfile

This specifies the name of the output tape file.

inputfile

This specifies the name of the input tape file.

5.23.4 Control File

Each line of the control file has the following format:

filename filetype filemode recfm l
recl type tapefile

filename

This is the 1 to 8 character name that represents the file name. The file name can
be specified as lower case, but will be translated to upper case to follow CMS con-
ventions. Allowed characters are [A-Z], [0-9], ‘$’ (dollar), ‘#’ (pound), ‘@’ (at), ‘+’
(plus), ‘-‘ (hyphen), ‘:’ (colon) and ‘_’ (underscore).

filetype

This is the 1 to 8 character name that represents the file type. The file type can be
specified as lower case, but will be translated to upper case to follow CMS conven-
tions. Allowed characters are [A-Z], [0-9], ‘$’ (dollar), ‘#’ (pound), ‘@’ (at), ‘+’ (plus),
‘ -‘ (hyphen), ‘:’ (colon) and ‘_’ (underscore).

filemode

This is the 1 to 2 character that represents the file mode. The first character is a let-
ter from A to Z and represents the “original” file mode when scanned on VM/370 (it
does not force the file to be loaded on a certain disk). The second character is a di-
git from 0 to 6. The file mode number indicates specific behaviour for the file under
CMS.

recfm

Indicates the record format and should be ‘F’ (for Fixed) or ‘V’ (for Variable).

lrecl

Indicates the logical record length. This should only be specified for RECFM F files.

type

Indicates how the file is processed before being written to tape. The value can
either be ‘B’ (Binary), ‘T’ (Text), or ‘S’ (Structured).

Binary files are not translated. For RECFM F files, the file is cut into records of the
size of the logical record length specified. For RECFM V files, the file is cut into re-
cords of 65535 bytes except for the last record which has a length of the reminder
of the file.

Textual files are translated from ASCII to EBCDIC and the trailing line termination
character is removed. For RECFM F files the record may be truncated or padded
with EBCDIC x'40' characters (white space, blanks). For RECFM V files, each re-
cord represents the length of the line up to 65535 characters.

Structured files contain structured information which indicate the 16 bit length of
each record in big endian format. For RECFM F files the record may be truncated
or padded. For RECFM V files the records are stored as is.

tapefile

The tape file is created or read as a HET (Hercules Emulated Tape) format. The
DUMP function creates a file, while SCAN and LOAD functions only read the file.