Date:         Sat, 16 Oct 2004 09:04:50 -0700
Reply-To:     Jesper Sahner <jespersahner@HOTMAIL.COM>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         Jesper Sahner <jespersahner@HOTMAIL.COM>
Organization: http://groups.google.com
Subject:      Re: DCB-information on a PC-file
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

Hi Alan!

Thanks for your reply, I will study the article.

When writing to a simple text-file on a mainframe, you usually specify
the DCB-details for the file before writing. I don't understand how
the PC takes care of this automatically. How are record-length,
end-of-line markers etc. handled, if you don't specify this?

Guess I will have to read the article before asking more questions :-)

Regards,
Jesper

"Alan Churchill" <REM0VETHISSTRINGTechSupport@savian.net> wrote in message news:<_g3cd.924$dZ.81818@news.uswest.net>...
> Jesper,
>
>  The file system handles it all for you on a PC. A possible source of info:
>
>  http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/file/ntfs/archFiles-c.html
>
>  It really depends on what you are trying to do. I think a question along those lines might be easier to answer.
>
>  Bear with me since it has been a few years since my MVS days and
coding DCBs&hellip;but on the mainframe, all resources need to be
allocated prior to use. The PC operates very differently in that
resources are demanded and received on the fly. Hence you have static
information, at that time, about a file but there aren't caps per se
on what it can hold. Also, I can call a picture a .gif or a .txt: the
extension is merely a &lsquo;suggestion' but the file system
determines the type based upon an event (user click saying &lsquo;open
this in an image editor) or a binary representation in the file.
>
>  The article above describes accessing the file system for the info but I would be leery of going down this route w/o knowing more about what you are trying to do. SAS has some insights into the file system however there are other ways of getting much more information (including going through SAS to an O\S type of command).
>
>   Thanks,
>
>  Alan
>
>
>
>  Savian
>
>  "Bridging SAS and Microsoft technologies"
>
>  www.savian.net
>
>
>
>    nntp://news.qwest.net/comp.soft-sys.sas/<7bb4f21d.0410152127.6a0eef76@posting.google.com>
>
>   Hi!
>
>  On a mainframe-file I am used to specify a number of DCB-informations
>  about a file, e.g. record length (LRECL), record format (VB, VBA, FB),
>  block size (BLKSIZE) etc.
>
>  But what about a PC-file? Is this information kept in the file-type,
>  e.g. .txt, .doc, .xls, .sas etc.? Can't be the whole truth.
>
>  How are PC-files in general organized (text- vs. binary-files etc.),
>  and how do I retrieve this information?
>
>  Regards,
>  Jesper
>
>
>  [comp.soft-sys.sas]