Re: Convert COBOL record layout specs to DDL or PF specs?

Well Buck, you bring up a good point. One of my first COBOL programs in
college was to do exactly that. Bring in one long string and parse it out
and validate each and every part of it before sticking it into columns.
However, IF that is your intent then one should eschew either COBOL or RPG
layouts for your input file. It should be just one long string and then
validated before moving into columns.
And various flavors of COBOL supported different things like, is the minus
sign trailing or leading?

However, for the OP's sake let's assume that he is doing all this and he
just wants the DDL so that he can generate the output file after the
editing is complete.

Or, maybe its like a highly trusted vendor who has an outstanding quality
program. Once you past the initial inspection and quality verification
you find that you no longer need the overhead of validating each shipment
for quality. He can try with an externally defined input file until he
runs into problems.


Rob Berendt