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…
Tag: ISPF v2.x
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…
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…
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…
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…
Pretty-TERMSIZE in MVS38J
Overview ISPF v.2.2 (ISPF-like product from Wally Mclaughlin) provides two specific Z-variables to expose terminal size, ZSCREEND and ZSCREENW, screen depth and screen width, respectively. Each variable is 4-bytes, zero-filled. For example, to display terminal size on a panel (e.g. primary menu, ISP@PRIM), one row (line) could be defined in the )BODY section as shown below: 1 2 3 4…
PRTSCR in MVS 3.8J
Overview PRTSCR – ISPFv2.2 Print Screen Utility(current version 0.9.01 2025-02-08) ISPF v2.2 (ISPF-like product from Wally Mclaughlin) does not include a print screen function (i.e. PRINT, PRINT-HI) as provided by the IBM ISPF product. ISPF maintains several system Z-variables for developer use. Some Z-type variables for screen information include ZSCREENW (screen width, e.g. 80), ZSCREEND (screen depth, e.g. 24) and…
GGUESS in MVS38J
GGUESS – Number Guessing Game across technology stacks from PC BASIC to MVS 3.8J TSO / ISPF / KICKS /Hercules to HTML JavaScript(current version 0.9.00 2024-05-01) One of my first programs to write (during the late 1970’s) was a number guessing game using interactive BASIC interpreters on the Altair 8800 and TRS-80 Model I microcomputers (Intel 8080 CPU). The program…
TASKLIST in MVS38J
Preview Using a daily planning application under ISPF to conveniently manage and maintain a to-do calendar list was a brilliant idea, especially in the 1980’s, before the availability of personal digital assistants (e.g. PalmPilot or Newton MessagePad)! On CBTTAPE.ORG, CBT231 contains such an application named TASKLIST written by Joe Veilleux from APC contributed circa 1985. Download CBT231 for reference and…