On 4 Sep 2005 11:48:24 -0700, "Paul Robinson" <paul@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
wrote:
>I am attempting to unpack on a PC, an EBCDIC Partitioned Data Set (PDS)
>container file and extract the members (it's one of many I have
>downloaded from the tape library, that one that has over 500 mainframe
>tape files on it, whose name escapes me). This means I want to be able
>to do extractions programmatically by reading the directory and any
>associated metadata contained in the PDS file for that purpose.
How was the PDS prepared for transfer to the PC. There are numerous
utilities that will package a PDS into a sequential file with enough
additional control information to allow it to be unpackaged. There is
the TSO xmit command, the venerable IEBCOPY utility, the relatively
new ADRDSSU (also known as DFSMSdss), probably the TRSMAIN utility,
etc. Unless you know how it was packaged, you will have a hell of a
time unpacking it. It sounds like you are looking at the CBT tape. If
so, they have their unpacking instructions on their web page,
cbttape.org.
>
>I need to find out the format of an IBM Mainframe PDS file and have
>been unable to find any references for it. I believe it is similar in
>concept to the old LBR archive file format (as opposed to say, ARC or
>ZIP archives because LBR did not compress files and ARC and ZIP do).
The format for a PDS is completely explained in the IBM manuals
available on the web. I think the one you want is Using Data Sets but
to be sure you should go to the IBM web site ibm.com, navigate to
do***entation, and search for partitioned data set directory
structure. The have both PDF and BookManager formats. BTW, PDS
formats are considerably older than an PC format.
>
>Short version of a long story: I do not have access to a mainframe and
>Hercules won't work on my Windows XP, but I have MUSIC/SP (sans
>utilites to read PDS datasets), which means I can't use tools like
>IEBGENER or whatever is normally used on mainframes for that purpose,
>so I wrote some quickie Turbo Pascal programs under MSDOS to, among
>many tools related to this purpose, to read an EBCDIC coded file and
>translate the EBCDIC data into ASCII so I can either extract the
>members of the PDS untranslated as pure EBCDIC or extract and translate
>(for doc files and source code).
>
>I have looked at the PDS files directly and can see that they consist
>of some kind of metadata such as prefix information, some kind of
>directory, then individual files, but with some extra coding stuck at
>points in the middle of the individual members which causes problems
>because they are then contaminated and I don't necessarily know where
>or how this extra code is inserted. It also causes problems for
>extracting, say, object files where I might not necessarily know what
>is actual ESD/RLD/TXT object record data and what is some of the file
>structure or metadata of the PDS container to which it is a member.
ESD/RLD/TXT records are unique to object and load modules (binary
code). What do you really want to do with these? Do you have a
disassembler?
>
>I would like to find either the format of a PDS or a reference to one
>of IBM's on-line manuals that I can download that would have it.
>
>Once I extract the individual members I can either upload them in
>binary as pure EBCDIC or I can translate them into source code as
>appropriate.
>
>I think I am at least a fair quality programmer, but I want to learn
>more and I need to read other people's code to do that.
>
>I figure once I get more experience I'll be good at it. I've been a
>notary public for 24 months and a computer programmer for 24 years.
>
>Thank you for any assistance you may be able to offer. You may send
>replies to the group or to me directly if you prefer.
>
>Paul Robinson
>"A computer programmer and Notary Public
>in and for the Commonwealth of Virginia, at large."
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