RE: RPG header spec

Hi Scott,

Thanks for refreshing my memory.

Janice Chester
Tefron USA, Inc.
P.O. Box 100
720 Main Street
Valdese, NC 28690
janicechester@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Phone: (828) 879-6518



-----Original Message-----
From: rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Scott Klement
Sent: Tuesday, October 09, 2007 3:33 PM
To: RPG programming on the AS400 / iSeries
Subject: Re: RPG header spec

Hi Janice,

Where do I look to find out how / where a dtaara is defined in the
header specs when RPGLE programs are compiled.

If you have no H-specs in your program, the system will search for a
data area named *LIBL/RPGLEHSPEC.

This is documented in the ILE RPG Reference manual at the following
link:
http://tinyurl.com/367r3j

For example (sorry if I mess up the syntax, this is from memory):

CRTDTAARA DTAARA(QGPL/RPGLEHSPEC) TYPE(*CHAR) LEN(80)
VALUE('DFTACTGRP(*NO) ACTGRP(''KLEMENTS'')
BNDDIR(''MAIN'':''QC2LE'')')

We have used this technique to force all programs to automatically
go into the KLEMENTS activation group (since I work for the Klement's
Sausage Company, we decided to put all of our programs in their own
activation group) and to force all of them to search the MAIN and QC2LE
binding directories.

MAIN is one we created that has all of our in-house created service
programs, so any program that wants to use them has only to make a call
to them -- no extra binding required. QC2LE contains the APIs included

with the ILE C runtime, which can be used to do some neat things from
RPG. So we have our programs automatically find those routines if
needed.

Unless I'm mistaken, you *MUST* have no H-specs in your code for the
data area to be used. If you supply any H-specs, it will not even look
for the data area.

Because of the variations in the H-specs we must use nowadays, we don't
use the data area any more. Instead we use a copybook, which lets us
have many variations if we want, and we can use BOTH the copy book and
additional H-specs coded in the program (the two can work together)
whereas I believe the data area won't work if any H-specs are coded in
the program.

But, YMMV.