Re: reference to variable fields in IBM copybooks

Scott Lindstrom wrote:

I think I found it - I switched these around and I in better shape (I
think):

SET MY-PTR UP BY LENGTH OF SQL-STATEMENT-TEXT-LEN
SET ADDRESS OF SQL-STATEMENT-TEXT2 TO MY-PTR

Scott:

I have a trivial example that you might want to review at:

http://code.midrange.com/2025d26869.html

I mostly used your variable names from /COPY, but I simply declared them as individual fields rather than copying the whole /COPY module. I declared SQL-STATEMENT-TEXT2 as a LINKAGE data item as a variable-length array of characters that OCCURS DEPENDING on the length field. It's declared within a 01-level group item that becomes "variable-length" as far as STRING is concerned.

The result of my STRING will show in the joblog, or in Command Entry detailed messages if you call from the command line. The result shows that only "Here is enough text" gets pulled from the variable-length array.

One specific item of caution -- If you're working with QIBM_QZDA_SQL2 with the ZDAQ0200 format, ensure that you do NOT use SQL-STATEMENT-TEXT2-LEN as your length field if it has a value greater than 1024. You might want to declare a different field and either move SQL-STATEMENT-TEXT2-LEN or 1024 into it depending on whether SQL-STATEMENT-TEXT2-LEN is too big. Also, decide how to handle a case where length is zero. Eventually you WILL run across both conditions (among various interesting others).

Tom Liotta