Handling of Zoned Decimal Items

The Connector presents certain COBOL items as zoned decimal numbers in the binary data. Such items are of USAGE DISPLAY, a numeric picture clause, and no SIGN SEPARATE clause.

The zoned decimal format represents all decimal digits in text — except for the last byte or possibly the first byte, depending on whether LEADING or TRAILING is in the SIGN clause. That byte contains both the decimal digit and the sign for the whole value. The sign is specified in the first nibble (half byte) and the decimal digit in the second nibble.

The zoned decimal format is one of three variations: EBCDIC, Strict ASCII, and Modified ASCII. The Connector expects a particular format, which depends on the Character Set setting or forceCharacterSet input field for the Render Copybook Data or Parse Copybook Data activity. For details on the related configurations, see the following sections.

EBCDIC Character Sets (Such As IBM037)

The Parse activity expects EBCDIC-zoned decimal format and fails if it encounters any of the ASCII format data. The EBCDIC-zoned decimal format uses EBCDIC codepoints for digits and defines the following sign nibbles for the sign byte:

• xC and xA: Sign positive
• xB and xD: Sign negative

The Parse accepts positive and negative nibbles for signed items (with S in the PICTURE clause for COBOL) and xF for both signed and unsigned items. Note that signed nibbles are not valid in an unsigned item.

The Render activity generates the signed nibbles : xC for positive and xD for negative signed data. For unsigned data, the activity generates xF.

The ASCII Zoned Format drop-down list and the input field asciiZonedFormat settings are disregarded.