Re: Exiting a unattended interactive application

We keep this in our standards for everyone to refer to.  Only new thing is
now you can put an error indicator on the EXFMT operation.  Used to you
couldn't, so you had to WRITE and then READ for this to work.

Timing out an interactive program:

1. INVITE keyword in the workstation DDS.  Compile with WAITRCD parm
specified with number of seconds. We have our default set to 1800.
2. Specify MAXDEV(*file) and INFDS with a data structure name on the F spec
for the workstation.
3. Set up the file information data structure for the workstation file with
a field name for the *STATUS keyword.
4. WRITE the format name and READ the file.  Use an error indicator on the
READ.  Condition the calcs after the READ to check for the error indicator
and status code 1331.  Perform whatever you want here for the time-out.
5. Immediately set the INVITE indicator off after the screen read.  This
will prevent I/O errors on the display file because of users who use
keyboard buffering.

Also, if you have a subfile, you should condition the invite in the DDS
with a not condition of the SFLCLR or SFLDLT.  If the invite is on when the
SFLCLR is issued, that will give I/O error.

We always use an indicator on the invite.  We even have one assigned for
that purpose in our standards.  If you are writing several overlay formats
and the invite is on, then the keyboard is open for input, even if all the
formats haven't been written to the screen.  If the user is using keyboard
buffering, it's conceivable that they could have already entered the next
screen, even before the screen is written.


Valene M. Williamson
IBM Certified Specialist
vwilliamson@xxxxxxxxxxx
972-448-8018