Overview DUMAPD – Display UCB Mapped for MVS38J / ISPF v 2.x / Hercules(current version 0.9.00 2025-09-06) The idea of displaying UCB (Unit Control Block) percolated from programmatically scanning of the UCB in my MVS 3.8J software development hobby projects! As mentioned, the thought occurred while setting the address of the UCB Lookup Table and pointing to the first UCB…
Group DASD in MVS 3.8J
Overview Group DASD in MVS 3.8J / ISPF v 2.x / Hercules(updated 2025-09-30) When submitting a batch MVS utility, in most cases, dataset allocations point to a specific volume serial as shown in the below sample JCL stream (highlighted in white): //IEBCOPY JOB LB,’COPY PDS 2 PDS’,CLASS=A,MSGCLASS=A, // MSGLEVEL=(1,1),NOTIFY=LARRY01 //* —————————————————————- //* COPY PDS TO ANOTHER //* —————————————————————- //STEP010 EXEC…
DEDTD in MVS38J
DEDTD – Display EDT Utility for MVS38J / ISPF v 2.x / Hercules(current version 0.9.00 2025-06-01) Overview Displaying of the EDT (Eligible Device Table) can be accomplished by using the TSO CP, UNITMAP, installed in MVS 3.8J TK3, TK4- and TK5 distributions as part of the DYNAMASK package. UNITMAP sources data from EDT and UCB to display results. The EDT…
DUNITD in MVS38J
DUNITD – Display UNIT NAMES Utility for MVS38J / ISPF v 2.x / Hercules(current version 0.9.00 2025-06-01) Overview Displaying of UNIT NAMES and associated devices (CUUs) can be accomplished by using the TSO CP, UNITS, installed in MVS 3.8J TK3, TK4- and TK5 distributions. Originally, UNITS installed on TK3 as a load member into SYS2.CMDLIB from tape (tsoutils.het) via JOB…
HERCPLEX in MVS 3.8J
Overview Several years ago, I experimented with the Shared DASD device functionality offered by the Hercules Emulator software v3.07 and v3.13. I quickly setup two separate Hercules instances sharing one DASD device following the Hercules Shared Device topics in the Hercules User Reference . Consequently, I moved away from that ‘project’ to another before completing and documenting! Today, using multiple…
Personal DSMON in MVS38J
Overview DSMON – Personal Dataset Monitor(current version 0.9.01 2025-08-08) One day, while reviewing output from the ISPF VTOC Utility add-on, option V (=3.7.V in TK5), with my userid HLQ as the DSN search argument, a numerous set of datasets were listed! Some resulting from manual testing. Others from applications… At this juncture, I realized an alert-type process (aka personal dataset…
MVS38J Software Contributions
Software contributions to the MVS 3.8J enthusiasts and hobbyists community are listed below in chronological order with most current announcement at top. Also, current development workload in progress is listed for awareness purposes to be published and announced at a later date. This post serves as an archive of announcements. Dates are in the format MM/DD/CCYY or monthname-day-ccyy. Thanks,Larry Belmontes…
User-Wide Software in TK5
Overview Corrections applied to step 4 under Implement User-Wide level on TK5 section. Installation of third-party and/or in-house (home-grown) software is ‘normal business’ in computing platforms, regardless of technology stacks. Additionally, safekeeping of user software and/or customization after an OS upgrade is paramount. However, keeping this impact to ‘zero’ is nearly impossible! Therefore, some form of exception is necessary by…
KICKS in TK5
Overview KICKS is a transaction processing system enabling execution of CICS programs directly under TSO and provides a high level of source code compatibility with CICS. Compilers supported (not an exhaustive list) include MVT COBOL and MVS GCC. KICKS is owned and authored by Mike Noel. Complete information on this product available at http://www.kicksfortso.com/ Installing KICKS on TK5 is as…
GGUESS in KICKS
Overview KICKS is a transaction processing system for CMS and TSO enabling execution of CICS programs directly under TSO and provides a high level of source code compatibility with CICS. Compilers supported (not an exhaustive list) include MVT COBOL and MVS GCC. KICKS is owned and authored by Mike Noel. Complete information on this product available at http://www.kicksfortso.com/ This post…