Conventions

#### Search Results

Search

# Conventions

The following conventions have been used in this manual:

### Use of Character Fonts

References to other manuals are shown in italics.

References to documents or sections within documents are shown in bold face.

Examples of utility output and file contents are shown in a typewriter font, for example:

    %ADADBM-I-OPENED,  ds DATA2, file DATA2.001 opened
    %ADADBM-F-DSSTALL, allocation error DSST

In examples which show both user input and utility output, the typewriter font is used for the whole example:

    adadbm: add_container = data, size = 35
    %ADADBM-I-OPENED,  ds DATA2, file DATA2.001 opened
    %ADADBM-F-DSSTALL, allocation error DSST

### Syntax Conventions

The syntax of the utility control parameters is as follows.

Items shown in UPPERCASE letters are keywords and must be entered exactly as shown. You can enter any keyword with uppercase or lowercase letters.

Items shown in lowercase letters indicate that you have to replace the item by a value of your choice. If the item is "number", you can specify any decimal number. Only positive numbers or 0 can be specified, no negative numbers are allowed. If the item is "string", you can specify a text string, i.e. any number of alphanumeric characters. For numbers or strings, it is also possible to specify hexadecimal values preceded by "0x", "0X". "^x" or "^X"; for numbers specified as hexadecimal values, leading zeroes may be omitted. Other items are possible, for example "descriptor", in which case your input must be a descriptor name.

Items enclosed in square brackets ("[", "]") are optional.

Items enclosed in curly brackets ("{", "}") are mandatory.

A vertical bar ("|") separates items which are alternatives, i.e. you can enter one item or the other but not both.

The ellipsis ("...") indicates that you can repeat the immediately preceding element of the syntax as often as you like.

If an ellipsis is preceded by a comma, i.e. ",...", this means that you can repeat the immediately preceding element of the syntax as often as you like, with a comma preceding each repetition.

If round brackets are used for a list of elements and only one keyword is supplied, the round brackets may be omitted if only one element is supplied.

#### Example 1

    RB=0x33445566

Here the string value has been specified as a hexadecimal string; it consists of printable characters equivalent to the ASCII character string "3DUf".

#### Example 2

    DBID = number

This means that you must type in the keyword "DBID" (using uppercase or lowercase letters or any combination thereof), followed by the "=" character, followed by a decimal number, for example:

    DBID = 27

#### Example 3

    RABN = number [ - number]

This means that you must type in the keyword "RABN" (using uppercase or lowercase letters or any combination thereof), followed by the "=" character, followed by a decimal number. You can also provide a hyphen ("-") followed by another decimal number, but this is not required. Here are a few examples of input that corresponds to this syntax:

    RABN = 25
    RABN = 1000 - 1125

#### Example 4

    RABN = 0x400

Here the value is specified as a hexadecimal value; it is the equivalent to specifying

    RABN = 1024

#### Example 5

    SORTSEQ = { descriptor | ISN }

This means that you must type in the keyword "SORTSEQ" (using uppercase or lowercase letters or any combination thereof), followed by the "=" character, followed by either a descriptor value or the keyword "ISN", for example:

    SORTSEQ = ISN

#### Example 6

    number[-number] [,number[-number] ] ...

This example shows the use of the ellipsis ("..."). Here, the ellipsis follows the syntax element "[,number[-number] ]". This means that you can repeat this syntax element as often as you like in your input line. Here are a few examples of input that corresponds to this syntax:

    27
    27-50
    27-50,68
    27,68-90
    27-50,68-90
    27-50,68-90,102,105,118-140,160

#### Example 7

As an alternative to example 4, the following syntax specification using the ",..." construction is also possible:

    { number[-number] },...

This syntax allows all of the combinations shown in example 4.

#### Example 8

    (number[,number]...)

Valid input examples for this syntax are.

    (12,23,45)
    (123)
    123 - only one list element, so brackets can be omitted

### Upper-Case Conversions

Parameter names that are specified are always converted to upper case.

For most utility control parameters, the specified parameter values are also converted to upper case, but this is not always desirable. Starting with Adabas Version 6.1.6, a new convention for upper-case conversion of control parameter values has been introduced:

- If you specify "parameter=value", the value is converted to upper case.

- If you specify "parameter:value", the value is not converted to upper case.

Although the option of specifying a colon or an equals sign after a parameter name has been introduced generally via the parser for all parameters, Software AG recommends that you specify a colon only for those parameters where it is explicitly described in the syntax, because the behaviour described above is only guaranteed for these parameters; due to compatibility reasons with previous Adabas versions, the upper-case conversion is handled differently for some other parameters.

#### Example

Assume the following syntax:

    NAME{=|:}string

If you specify

    NAME=Production

The parameter value for `NAME` is set to "PRODUCTION".

If you specify

    NAME:Production

The parameter value for `NAME` is set to "Production".

However, some utility input is not provided as "parameter{=|:}value", for example field, descriptor or referential constraint definitions. The specifications are converted to upper case by default, unless the parameter LOWER_CASE_FIELD_NAMES has been specified before the definitions.

Note
After specifying LOWER_CASE_FIELD_NAMES, none of the definitions are converted to upper case; then you must specify keywords, for example field options, in upper case.

#### Example

Without LOWER_CASE_FIELD_NAMES, the field definition

    1,aa,8,a,de

is correct and is equivalent to

    1,AA,8,A,DE

With LOWER_CASE_FIELD_NAMES, however, this field definition is invalid; in order to define the field "aa", you must specify

    1,aa,8,A,DE

### Field Specifications

Several utilities contain parameters that allow the specification of Adabas fields. The exact syntax for the field specifications depends on the parameter in question: for example, while for ADAINV INVERT, the specification of a field name is sufficient, ADADBM ADD_FIELD requires a complete field definition.

These field specifications can be terminated with an END_OF_FIELDS parameter.

Notes:

1. After specifying LOWER_CASE_FIELD_NAMES, the END_OF_FIELDS parameter must be specified in upper case.
2. In ADACMP and ADADCU, a period (.) can be specified instead of END_OF_FIELDS.

END_OF_FIELDS can be omitted at the end of the parameter specifications for the utilities. If you want to add other parameters after the field specifications, END_OF_FIELDS is required.

Note
With Adabas versions before V6.3 SP 3, for some utilities END_OF_FIELDS was also required at the end of the parameter specifications. If END_OF_FIELDS was missing, the function was not executed.

### Symbols used in control parameter summaries

The description of each utility contains a table which summarizes the syntax of the control parameters that are available for that utility. Some control parameters are preceded by the letter "M" or the letter "D".

The letter "M" indicates "mandatory", i.e. the you must specify this parameter in your input to the utility otherwise the utility cannot run. If the letter "M" is not present, the parameter is optional, i.e. you do not have to specify it.

The letter "D" indicates that the control parameter has a default value. This means that if you do not specify this parameter explicitly in your input, the utility will use a preset value for the parameter.

### Order of parameters

The parameters of the utilities are listed in this documentation in alphabetical order, but in some cases, there are restrictions on the order in which they can or must be specified. Usually, the DBID parameter has to be specified first, and depending on the utility, there may be more restrictions.

For multi-function utilities in particular, there are some parameters that immediately trigger a function. In these cases, other parameters specified after such a parameter are ignored. However, these parameters are used if you specify another function afterwards.

#### Example:

    adavfy dbid=34 file=9 index file=11 data

The parameter INDEX triggers the index verification; for this parameter, the preceding specification "file=9" is relevant. The DATA parameter triggers the data verification; for this parameter, the preceding specification "file=11" is relevant. The command triggers an index verification of file 9 and a data verification of file 11.

### Numeric Values

Numeric values may be specified in the following ways:

- number

- number[K], where the value is 1024*number

- number[M], where the value is 1024*1024*number

number[K] and number[M] are only allowed in cases in which large numeric values are expected.

### Maximum Values

Maximum values for numeric parameters are only mentioned if there is a fixed limit that is given by restrictions within Adabas. They are not mentioned if they result from the fact that a 4 byte signed or unsigned integer is used to store the variable: in this case, the limit may be defined a little smaller than the maximum possible integer, for example 4000 M.

### Syntax Diagrams in the HTML Documentation

There is a syntax diagram at the start of each utility description, and these diagrams contain links to the detailed descriptions of the keywords and parameters that are available. The hyperlinks in these syntax diagrams are underlined in order to make them visible, but please note that the underlining is not a part of the syntax.

### Procedure Flow

The utility documentation contains procedure flow diagrams that show which files are accessed by the utility. If the utilities access database containers, they also read the ADABAS.INI and DBnnn.INI files in order to find out the container locations. In order to keep the diagrams simple, ADABAS.INI and DBnnn.INI are only mentioned if they are modified.

### Obsolete Parameters

Sometimes, utility or nucleus parameters will become obsolete when a new version of Adabas is released. Usually, the obsolete parameters are still accepted by the utility of the nucleus, but you will receive a PAROBS warning, for example:

    %ADANUC-W-PAROBS, parameter NH has become obsolete