Re: Renaming one field in a file, without affecting anything else

James wrote:

I'm running into a field name collision between two files (one of which
already has a PREFIX clause that, ironically, while preventing a whole
bunch of collisions, is the cause of this one).

Is there a way, without having to I-spec an entire file, or change the
prefix (which could break an awful lot of code), to rename the one
offending field?

It's on a V6 customer box, so all the "slick new stuff" I try to avoid
in core code is available.

then Joe wrote:
Yup. I-spec for the format name, then use a second I-spec to specify
the internal and external names of the colliding field.


Joe -

Technically, the 2nd I spec (used to specify the internal and external
fields) is known by the SEU and WDSC prompters as a J spec.

To prompt it,

1) In SEU use IPJX in the sequence number field to insert and prompt it, or
2) In WDSC insert a blank line then type PJX in the sequence number column
to get the prompt screen.

Regards,
sjl

Not to be too pedantic about it, but there is no such thing as a J-spec. It's an input specification or I-spec for short. But because an I-spec has so many different formats, the prompters used J to prompt for the field-level I-specs (much the same way they used the letter P to indicate field-level O-specs), and JX for the externally defined field-level spec.

I think only those of us old enough to have used the SEU prompter on a regular basis actually ever used the term "J-spec"; it's certainly not in the literature anywhere. In fact, if you do as you noted and type in PJX to bring up the prompter in RDP you will see that the line type for the field is spelled out this way "I: Input, Field Description, Externally Described File".

Your point is taken; we have colloquially called it a J-spec. But technically it is not a J-spec, it's still an I-spec.

Joe