Pass Date in the DSN as MMMDD ina JCL

chockalingam_rsp · New User Joined: 13 Aug 2009 Posts: 43 Location: chennai

Hi ,

i want to pass the current date in the format MMMDD as a LLQ in a JCL . How can i do that ?

This input file is being passed from another system . My jcl uses this file and does a SORT on this file.

//JS025R EXEC PGM=SORT
//SYSOUT DD SYSOUT=X
//SYSPRINT DD SYSOUT=X
//SYSUDUMP DD SYSOUT=X
//SORTIN DD DSN=INPUT.SEQFILE.<<DEC02>>,
// DISP=SHR,DCB=BUFNO=35
//SORTOUT DD DSN=OUTPUT.FILE,
// DISP=(,CATLG,DELETE),
//SYSIN DD *

everytime i run this jcl , i am going and changing it manually . .

Can you help on how this can be automated ?

steve-myers · Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2014 6:07 am

The first problem with this idea is something like 1202 is not a valid index element in a data set name. It must be something like D1202.

The second problem is it is entirely unnecessary. This is why generation data groups were invented nearly 50 years ago. I strongly recommend reading Appendix A. Generation Data Sets in "MVS JCL User's Guide" for your z/OS release.

Robert Sample · Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2014 6:30 am

If you want the LLQ to be something like DEC14, you probably can use your site's job scheduler to do so. If you don't want to use the job scheduler, plan on writing a program in the language of your choice to generate the JCL, then submit the generated JCL via the internal reader. JCL doesn't really support many features and date manipulation is NOT one of the supported features.

David Robinson · Active User Joined: 21 Dec 2011 Posts: 199 Location: UK

As Robert has said, using your scheduler to generate the date is the way to go on this, although whether a month format of MMM is supported out of the box may be another matter.

In TWS for example, the nearest you could get would be &CMM&CDD but that would give you a date such as 1203 not DEC03. Perhaps you could get the name of the source file changed?

Failing that (again, using TWS as an example) you would have to set up a JCL variable table that maps 01 to JAN, 02 to FEB, etc.

chockalingam_rsp · New User Joined: 13 Aug 2009 Posts: 43 Location: chennai

Thank you all for your replies.