FSVO show. The job will run and use the wrong dataset, with no warning. Because of the ambiguous ampersand, there is only one place at which IBM can catch the error.
If you really want to complain, look at the CLIST change on OS/VS2 R3.6, with its massive increase in the number of apostrophes needed for some parameters. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz http://mason.gmu.edu/~smetz3 ________________________________________ From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [[email protected]] on behalf of Charles Mills [[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, December 2, 2021 4:38 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Trying to use long parm= in started task Okay, I get it, but this ship is not very ship-shape. Seeing as DSN=&MYPRM means what it means, then when IBM introduced variable symbols they should have used && or % or something, not a single ampersand. Yeah, yeah, that boat has departed the dock. The IEFC657I does not really do the job though, does it? If I have PROC MYPARM='SYS1.FOO' and mistakenly code DSN=&MYPRM then I will not get an error on it assuming I have also coded something=&MYPARM elsewhere in the PROC. Right? I think I still say that two wrongs don't make a right. Flagging what (I say) should be a non-error is not the answer to some other coding mistake. If someone codes DSN=&MYPRM the error will show up somewhere, either as a DSN not found or as a "can't catalog a temp DSN" or something. Charles -----Original Message----- From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Seymour J Metz Sent: Thursday, December 2, 2021 12:27 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Trying to use long parm= in started task > 1. I fail to see the benefit. If I code the proc with MYPARM='FOO' and then > mistakenly code &MYPRM instead of &MYPARM in the body of the PROC, then the > error is the undefined &MYPRM, //SYSBAR DD DSN=&MYPRM,DISP=(MOD,PASS) Is valid. At the time IBM defined the syntax, there were no symbolic parameters. Changing that to invalid would break every job that used a single ampersand for a temporary dataset name. Do I like it? No, but that ship has sailed. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
