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  1.  Home
  2. RPG400-L
  3. August 2003

Re: Record name the same as the file name

Bob cozzi wrote:
Even more so that local files, I'd like to see the ability to share the I/O
buffer of a file between modules. For example: Declare file CUSTMAST in MODA and do a READ to that file
somewhere in the main-line calcs or a subproc in MODA, then call a proc in
MODB and have that proc in MODB be able to see the input fields from the
read in MODA.
I can do this today with smoke, magic and mirrors, but it should be easier.
To make it easy, we'd only need the EXPORT and IMPORT keywords at the FILE
level, and Toronto to do the work under the covers. <g>

Even with IMPORT and EXPORT on the F-Spec, "smoke, magic and mirrors" would still be an apt description, and perhaps even more so. IMPORT and EXPORT under any circumstances still allow you to define "hidden" interfaces between modules, and so generally are to be avoided in practice. The problem is that you'd be sharing variable storage, not the I/O buffers.

If you need to communicate whole records between modules, a better approach would be to code data structure results on the I/O operations (new to V5R2), and pass the DS as a parameter between the procedures. Granted, the current support is a bit restrictive in that only LIKEREC data structures are allowed, but we are looking at ways to relax the rules. And this approach still doesn't give you as much as a "file pointer" since you still wouldn't be able to read in one module and update in another. (Not that you'd necessarily want to do that, eh?)

(Actually, we've been flip-flopping a bit on exactly how loose to make the rules on result DS on external-described I/O. But now we're settling in on requiring the DS to be a LIKEREC DS like the specified record, an EDS defined like the specified record, or a DS defined using LIKEDS like either of the first two, with some additional flexibility for read by file name. The change is now planned for V5R3.)

I suppose the bottom line is that there are indeed lots of ways to improve the I/O model in RPG, and we are not unaware of them.

Cheers! Hans



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