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August 2001
To: Users of Robelle Software Re: News of the HP e3000 and Robelle, 2001 #4 If you haven't been visiting the Robelle web site, www.robelle.com, at least once a week, here is what you have been missing. Included are many of the stories posted to the web since the last What's Up DOC newsletter in June 2001.If you are reading a PDF or text version of this newsletter, remember that the headline of every story is actually a web link to the full story or more information. If you want to follow a link to get more information, go to the web home of the current newsletter: http://www.robelle.com/library/newsletter/latest.html Table of Contents: |
IMAGE is the database of the HP e3000 system, and some knowledge of how it works is useful for anyone doing IT work on the system. “Master Datasets” are one of the storage types of IMAGE and their job is to store records when there is one record expected per unique key field (also the search field). For example, one customer record per customer number. IMAGE uses a mathematical formula called a hashing algorithm to transfer the key value into a record number within the master dataset. This “hash location” is the first place where IMAGE tries to store the record. Figure 1 shows a hashing algorithm with a collision occuring in the same block
... click the link above to see Figure 1 and read the rest of the column.
/users/progdev/projects/01admin/phase1/src/plan.html
or much longer and more obscure "paths" to files!
You can open these files in Qedit for Windows by navigating through the directory window with your mouse, but often you need to enter the full file name into a host-command. A typical example is a CD command to the directory containing the file.
Qedit for Windows has a simple option to make the pathname of any open file easily accessible. Just Right-Click in the text window and select Copy pathname to clipboard. Now you can paste the pathname of your file into a script you are building, or the QWIN host-command window, or even a terminal emulator window.
For more Windows tips, visit the permanent location of these articles.
For some time, users have been aggressively asking us how to update a field in a dataset, or even a file, with a value from another file, based on a key. A classic example: Your boss comes to you with a list of new prices for certain parts and asks you to update the Part-Master dataset. Big News: You can now do this easily in Suprtool. Starting with pre-release 4.4.10, just load the new prices into a Table, index by the product number (prodno), then Extract the price field from each record and replace it with a $lookup on the table.
define tiny,1,1,integer
Warning: Length of 1 is of limited use for the data type INTEGER
You will find that you cannot do the usual arithmetic operations on these 1-byte integers. The solution is to extra them as 2-byte integers by padding them with a leading binary zero, then do another pass through the output file to work with the resulting 2-byte integer. For example, this is what you would do if you need to add two 1-byte integers together:
input yourfile define tiny1,1,1 define tiny2,2,1 ext ^0,tiny1, ^0,tiny2 out tmp xeq input tmp define num1,1,2,integer define num2,3,2,integer define sum,1,2,integer ext sum = num1 + num2 out result xeq
We didn't make "tmp" a self-describing Link file because we needed to redefine the 4 byte fields as two 2-byte integer fields in the second pass, so passing on the structure from the first pass was of limited value. It was clearer and easier to just Define the num1 and num2 fields from scratch.
Do the debits equal the credits?
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:run suprtool.pub.robelle
>base fms.gl,5,reader
>get d-transactions
>output $null
>total trans-amt
>xeq
Totals (SUN, JAN 29, 1995, 2:56 PM):
TRANS-AMT 81451+
IN=6, OUT=6. CPU-Sec=1. Wall-Sec=1.
By default the results of the Total command are displayed on the screen ($STDLIST),
but can be appended to the output file. To do, this you need to turn Set Squeeze Off
and add a new Total command as follows:
total $file filename,appendThis tip is taken from the Robelle tutorial Ensuring Data Integrity With Suprtool (PDF Format).
Searching for Multiple Strings: to match lines with more than one string in the same line,
do list "bob" or "sam"
Changing Cobol Tags: to edit the tag area of a COBOL line (columns 73-80), do
changet "bob-june"sam-july"
Specifying a Default Increment: to override Qedit's calculated line number increment when
Texting a large file, do a Set Increment command and then do text bigfile,setincr
Posix command shortcut: to execute a command line through the POSIX shell, precede it with an exclamation (!).
Full-screen mode: now resets the terminal width when returning to line editing, recognizes and supports the QCTERM emulator from AICS.
Since we have switched to rolling-updates and multiple releases per year, customers with paid support will receive your Qedit update on their anniversary date (or sooner). For more information on this release, read the change document.
Robelle Solutions Technology Inc. provides the What's Up, DOCumentation? newsletter as a service to our customers. The newsletter is available on the web: in HTML format for browsing and PDF format for printing. Visit www.robelle.com/library/newsletter/
Comments about this issue, as well as ideas for future issues, including news, tips, and suggestions for articles, can be sent to bgreen@robelle.com.