COBOL

I can't find any documentation on assign statements with
-UT- in them.    Does the 'UT' stand for Unit Tape or Utility Tape?

You don't tell us

- COMPILER (release, version, and vendor)

- Operating system (e.g. VSE, MVS, z/OS, Windows, whatever)

- What YOUR compiler vendor's documentation (LRM) says for the "Select/Assig
n
clause).

***

However, for IBM mainframes the bottom-line is that UT-xxxx is a feature fro
m
VERY old (long unsupported) compilers that is IGNORED (treated as a comment)
 in
all currently supported compilers.


--
Bill Klein
wmklein <at> ix.netcom.com
"TammyBain" <baint@cityofrochester.gov> wrote in message
 news:781a5bf97064111bb1fb057deb0cb1a0@lo
calhost.talkaboutprogramming.com...
>I can't find any documentation on assign statements with
> -UT- in them.    Does the 'UT' stand for Unit Tape or Utility Tape?
>

On Wed, 22 Dec 2004 17:09:25 -0500, "TammyBain"
<baint@cityofrochester.gov> wrote:

>I can't find any documentation on assign statements with
>-UT- in them.    Does the 'UT' stand for Unit Tape or Utility Tape?

Device-specific assignments are obsolete. Nowadays,  ASSIGN statements
take three forms:

1.  SELECT file ASSIGN TO '/path/file'

2.  SELECT file ASSIGN TO data-name (which contains /path/file)

3. SELECT file ASSIGN TO ddname (environment variable or JCL
containing /path/file)

Robert Wagner wrote:
> On Wed, 22 Dec 2004 17:09:25 -0500, "TammyBain"
> <baint@cityofrochester.gov> wrote:
>
> 
>
>
> Device-specific assignments are obsolete. Nowadays,  ASSIGN statements
> take three forms:
>
> 1.  SELECT file ASSIGN TO '/path/file'
>
> 2.  SELECT file ASSIGN TO data-name (which contains /path/file)
>
> 3. SELECT file ASSIGN TO ddname (environment variable or JCL
> containing /path/file)

"PRN".

Donald

Donald Tees wrote:
> Robert Wagner wrote:
> 
>
>
> "PRN".
>
> Donald
>
>

Not to mention standard-in and standard-out, though I suppose they are
really "JCL names".  Maybe printers are as well. Depends on how you look
at it. What is the context TamyBain? Platform and compiler?

Donald

"TammyBain" <baint@cityofrochester.gov> wrote in message
 news:781a5bf97064111bb1fb057deb0cb1a0@lo
calhost.talkaboutprogramming.com...
> I can't find any documentation on assign statements with
> -UT- in them.    Does the 'UT' stand for Unit Tape or Utility Tape?
>
>
The UT stands for "Utility". In the very olden days, before disks were
invented and freely available, this was tape. Later, replaced by disk
drives, these "utility" devices were available for any kind of storage
requirement. The UT was not about a physical device, it was about the
logical use of a physical device, i.e. as a "Utility".

Other posts have covered the implications for COBOL; I just thought your
actual question needed an answer.

Pete.

On 22-Dec-2004, "TammyBain" <baint@cityofrochester.gov> wrote:

> I can't find any documentation on assign statements with
> -UT- in them.    Does the 'UT' stand for Unit Tape or Utility Tape?

Is this for historical interest?

Back in the days when this actually meant something, I used to keep clone of
 the
various assign statements I wanted to use, and then copied them in to the ne
w
programs.   I'm glad that this is no longer necessary.

"Robert Wagner" <spamblocker-robert@wagner.net> wrote in message
 news:137ks05k9jnticqq4qihfq5obkmlri1lam@
4ax.com...

> Device-specific assignments are obsolete. Nowadays,  ASSIGN statements
> take three forms:
>
> 1.  SELECT file ASSIGN TO '/path/file'
>
> 2.  SELECT file ASSIGN TO data-name (which contains /path/file)
>
> 3. SELECT file ASSIGN TO ddname (environment variable or JCL
> containing /path/file)

Ummm.... In what context?   Although exactly *what* a file may be assigned
to is still defined by the implementor, ISO/IEC 1989:2002 specifically
changed the terminology for the non-literal case from "implementor-name-1"
to "device-name".

While IBM may have favored such intutively-clear device-names as
"SYS00C-UR-2540R-S" at one time, Unisys MCP-based systems have gone more
toward such unfathomable mnemonics as "READER" and "DISK" in this context,
believing that more specific assignation than that is rightly more the
purview of the operating environment than of the COBOL program itself.

-Chuck Stevens

On Thu, 23 Dec 2004 22:00:38 +1300 "Pete Dashwood" <dashwood@enternet.co.nz>
wrote:

:>"TammyBain" <baint@cityofrochester.gov> wrote in message
:> news:781a5bf97064111bb1fb057deb0cb1a0@lo
calhost.talkaboutprogramming.com..
.
:>> I can't find any documentation on assign statements with
:>> -UT- in them.    Does the 'UT' stand for Unit Tape or Utility Tape?

:>The UT stands for "Utility". In the very olden days, before disks were
:>invented and freely available, this was tape. Later, replaced by disk
:>drives, these "utility" devices were available for any kind of storage
:>requirement. The UT was not about a physical device, it was about the
:>logical use of a physical device, i.e. as a "Utility".

More precisely it defined a device that could be "rewound" and reprocessed,
but could not be processed by block number.

UR defined a device that could not be re-processed.

DA added the ability to randomly access blocks.

In Ye Olde Days the DCB (file descriptor) for a device will less capability
used less memory.

--
Binyamin Dissen <bdissen@dissensoftware.com>
http://www.dissensoftware.com

Director, Dissen Software, Bar & Grill - Israel


Should you use the mailblocks package and expect a response from me,
you should preauthorize the dissensoftware.com domain.

I very rarely bother responding to challenge/response systems,
especially those from irresponsible companies.

I liked the first time I worked on a VAX, discovering that I could either pu
t
the file name in the ASSIGN clause, or have it redirected by DCL.   The COBO
L
didn't care what the file looked like anyway, that was the operating system'
s
business.

This was before PCs.