Cobol - Program to Convert copybook to C structure

Author

Program to Convert copybook to C structure

Karen Monkres

2005-10-21, 6:55 pm

Is there a program that will convert a copybook record layout to a C
structure? Thanks

Ron

Michael Mattias

2005-10-21, 6:55 pm

> Is there a program that will convert a copybook record layout to a C
> structure? Thanks

I've never seen one.

Then again, you can probably convert a 100-member COBOL record to C format
in about 30 minutes and it's 'by definition' a one-time job, so I'm not
surprised no one has ever tried to create a 'utility' to do it

But if you don't know the COBOL datatypes, it would be pretty hard. So
download this...
http://www.flexus.com/ftp/cobdata.zip
... for a tutorial on COBOL datatypes. (The included software is VERY old and
not much fun to use, but the text is still good)

If you have a COBOL source or copyboook, this might be useful:
http://www.flexus.com/ftp/cobfd.zip
That's some MS-DOS (you heard me, MS-DOS) software which will parse your
file and create a report of offsets and data lengths for every variable in
the copybook.

--
Michael Mattias
Tal Systems, Inc.
Racine WI
mmattias@talsystems.com

William M. Klein

2005-10-21, 6:55 pm

Micro Focus used to have a utility that created COPY members out of header files
(if I recall correctly) - but I don't recall anything that did the opposite. (I
could be wrong on this and I don't know if it is still available)

--
Bill Klein
wmklein <at> ix.netcom.com
"Michael Mattias" <michael.mattias@gte.net> wrote in message
news:hZd6f.1220$Y61.1182@newssvr33.news.prodigy.com...
>
> I've never seen one.
>
> Then again, you can probably convert a 100-member COBOL record to C format
> in about 30 minutes and it's 'by definition' a one-time job, so I'm not
> surprised no one has ever tried to create a 'utility' to do it
>
> But if you don't know the COBOL datatypes, it would be pretty hard. So
> download this...
> http://www.flexus.com/ftp/cobdata.zip
> .. for a tutorial on COBOL datatypes. (The included software is VERY old and
> not much fun to use, but the text is still good)
>
> If you have a COBOL source or copyboook, this might be useful:
> http://www.flexus.com/ftp/cobfd.zip
> That's some MS-DOS (you heard me, MS-DOS) software which will parse your
> file and create a report of offsets and data lengths for every variable in
> the copybook.
>
> --
> Michael Mattias
> Tal Systems, Inc.
> Racine WI
> mmattias@talsystems.com
>
>
>
>

Howard Brazee

2005-10-24, 6:55 pm

On Fri, 21 Oct 2005 23:44:18 GMT, "William M. Klein"
<wmklein@nospam.netcom.com> wrote:

>Micro Focus used to have a utility that created COPY members out of header files
>(if I recall correctly) - but I don't recall anything that did the opposite. (I
>could be wrong on this and I don't know if it is still available)

Some IDDs allow us to have working data structures that are read by
multiple languages.

Of course a procedure division copy member doesn't work this way.

Richard

2005-10-25, 9:55 pm

> Is there a program that will convert a copybook record
> layout to a C structure?

It is unlikely to be useful to do that. Cobol has types of data that
aren't implemented in C so you cannot just map a struct over a Cobol
record and then expect to use the data items.

For example a Cobol alphanumeric data item may be PIC X(24) and this is
space filled 24 characters. C would usually require a null terminator
to make this a string and so would need to be char name[25] with null
moved to name[24].

Numeric items may be display format with implied decimal point, or
packed decimal or binary.

The data items will need extracting and converting into a C structure
of your own devicing.

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