IEFZB476 getting various 0C4 abends

Grant Goodale · Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2015 9:27 pm

I am trying to use IEFZB476 to display some messages coming from a failed SVC 99 invocations. I seem to be getting various 0C4 abends when I do this. Examples of actual IEFZB476 seem to be non-existent. I do have two questions about this interface:

(1) Is EMS99RBP the pointer to S99RBP or S99RB ?
(2) Does the caller have to supply the address of an area in EMBUFP when EMRETURN is active? If so, how big an area should be provided?

I have tried various searched and tests and I cannot find the answer.

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

PeterHolland · Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2015 10:51 pm

Examples may be non existent, but information not :

www-01.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSLTBW_2.1.0/com.ibm.zos.v2r1.ieaa800/db476fn.htm

Grant Goodale · Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2015 11:27 pm

Yes, I have been to those pages. It still leaves my questions unanswered.

Thanks

steve-myers · Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2015 1:00 am

I know I tried using it. Not that long ago, in fact. I don't know about Mr. Holland's link. It's documented in MVS Auth Assembler Services Guide. I hope you read it very carefully. I was trying to get more complete messages than "DAIRFAIL" puts out. I think I got the messages, but concluded the messages were hardly better than "DAIRFAIL's" messages and it wasn't worth the hassle of trying to use it. That's my impression, anyway, you might get better results than me.

I think EMS99RBP points to the S99RB, just like DFS99RBP
Return area size: I'd try the value in EMNMSGBK times EMLEN2

Sadly, my memory is hazy, and I think I discarded the attempt

Grant Goodale · Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2015 1:11 am

Many thanks. That is the information that I was looking for. Strange that my Google searches did not turn up a reference to that manual.

PeterHolland · Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2015 10:06 am

A Google on svc 99 should have pointed you there.

Grant Goodale · Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2015 5:21 pm

I was Googling of IEFZB476 and various EM field names.

Thanks

steve-myers · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2015 11:16 am

Well, this was a wasted effort -

DAIRFAIL --
IKJ56894I DATA SET XXXXXX.IEFZB476.OBJ NOT ALLOCATED+
IKJ56894I STORAGE MANAGEMENT SUBSYSTEM DETECTED AN ERROR, EITHER MESSAGES WERE NOT REQUESTED OR A SYSTEM ERROR OCCURRED
IEFZB476 --
IKJ56894I DATA SET XXXXXX.IEFZB476.OBJ NOT ALLOCATED+
IKJ56894I STORAGE MANAGEMENT SUBSYSTEM DETECTED AN ERROR, EITHER MESSAGES WERE NOT REQUESTED OR A SYSTEM ERROR OCCURRED

The allocation request was for an existing data set.

In terms of code -

Grant Goodale · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2015 5:07 pm

I was using LOAD and BALR. Still got an 0C4. I looked at the control blocks in memory without IEFDB476 and did my message scanning directly.

Thanks.

steve-myers · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2015 5:55 pm

Grant Goodale · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2015 6:02 pm

I was running in 31 bit mode.

steve-myers · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2015 6:37 pm

Did you do something like this?

Grant Goodale · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2015 6:43 pm

My code was:

steve-myers · Posted: Wed Sep 16, 2015 1:18 am

Now that's annoying.

It appears if you do a DYNALLOC and then run DAIRFAIL followed by IEFDB476 against the same S99RB and S99RBX, DB476 fails. Similarly, run DB476 and DAIRFAIL, DAIRFAIL will fail.

Grant, I ran DB476 using LOAD and CALL, and it ran OK.

I changed EMFUNCT to EMRETURN+EMKEEP, and ran DB476 followed by DAIRFAIL, and DAIRFAIL ran OK.

In my first trial that worked, I ran DYNALLOC without an S99RBX. In these trials I've been running with an S99RBX. I'm getting these messages -

IEFZB476 --
IKJ56893I DATA SET XXXXXX.IEFZB476.OBJ NOT ALLOCATED+
IGD17101I DATA SET XXXXXX.IEFZB476.OBJ
NOT DEFINED BECAUSE DUPLICATE NAME EXISTS IN CATALOG
RETURN CODE IS 8 REASON CODE IS 38 IGG0CLEH
DAIRFAIL --
IKJ56893I DATA SET XXXXXX.IEFZB476.OBJ NOT ALLOCATED+
IGD17101I DATA SET XXXXXX.IEFZB476.OBJ

I do not regard the DAIRFAIL messages as satisfactory, but that's outside the scope of this forum. It seems DAIRFAIL is running IEFDB476 under the covers, and returning the first 2 messages. But I'm just guessing here.

Grant, this, too, is outside the scope of this forum. I can't do this as I am not employed by an official z/OS user, but ...

Someone should open a PMR against the IEFZB476 macro. The computation of EMLEN2 is flawed because only 255 bytes are defined between EMBUF2 and EMLEN2. I suggest 3 possible solutions:

Add a DS C just before EMLEN2
Add a DS 0H just before EMLEN2.
Change the definition of EMLEN2 to

EMLEN2 EQU 2*(EMBUF2-EMBUF1)

Grant Goodale · Posted: Wed Sep 16, 2015 1:28 am

I am not knowingly invoking DAIRFAIL. I will give the test another try with no S99RBX later this week. I will keep you posted.

Thanks for all your help.

steve-myers · Posted: Wed Sep 16, 2015 6:15 am

FWIW, my RBX was built like this -

Grant Goodale · Posted: Wed Sep 16, 2015 9:26 pm

I now have it working and using an S99RBX. My 0C4 was caused by a dumb rookie move. On entry to IEFDB476, I had R1 pointing to EMPARMS rather than the address of EMPARMS. Your comment about setting the high order bit tipped me off to that.

Many thanks for all the help, it is much appreciated.

steve-myers · Posted: Wed Sep 16, 2015 10:30 pm

steve-myers · Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2015 8:58 pm