This document covers the following topics:
When installing Natural and Natural Security, you can now choose ApplinX as an additional package to be installed. You choose this package if you plan to use ApplinX and a browser instead of a standard VT terminal emulation. Starting with this version of Natural, the Entire Screen Builder package is no longer used for ApplinX.
Unicode is now supported. The new format U has been introduced and there are new/changed statements, parameters, system variables, etc. For details, see the Unicode and Code Page Support documentation. See also the example library SYSEXV which provides examples of the new Unicode features in this Natural version.
The new Natural Web I/O Interface is provided. In a remote development environment, it is used to display output which contains Unicode characters. When used in a production environment, the new Natural Web I/O Interface is required for Unicode programs. In the /appserver directory of the product CD, there are implementations for both J2EE and .NET servers. See Natural Web I/O Interface for further information.
With Natural Version 6.3.4, a new database driver ADA2 is delivered that supports features introduced with Adabas 6 (Open Systems) and Adabas 8 (mainframe). This includes support of Adabas large objects fields, Adabas LA fields and extended Adabas buffer lengths. See also Adabas Database Management Interfaces ADA and ADA2 in the Programming Guide.
By default, the "old" database driver ADA is used. This ensures that your Natural applications run as usual; there is no difference to previous Natural versions. Only when you define the database type ADA2 in the Configuration Utility, the new database driver will be used.
With this version of Natural, the object type "function" is introduced. See User-Defined Functions in the Programming Guide for further details.
As of this version, Natural supports non-Natural files (also known as resources). For more information, see Using Non-Natural Files - Resource in the Programming Guide.
With this version of Natural, X-arrays (eXtendible arrays) are supported. For further information on purpose, definition and usage of X-arrays, see X-Arrays in the Programming Guide.
The new system file FDDM is a container where all DDMs can
be stored. For more information, see
System File FDDM in the
Operations documentation.
The following new Natural statements are provided in this version:
| Statement | Description |
|---|---|
DEFINE FUNCTION |
Create new user-defined functions which may be called instead of operands in the Natural statements. |
DEFINE PROTOTYPE |
Specify a signature according to a certain function call. |
OPTIONS |
Used to specify compilation options as parameters for the current Natural programming object. |
PARSE XML |
Parse XML documents from a Natural program. |
As of this version, all new system functions are preceded by an asterisk (*) to avoid conflicts with, for example, user-defined variables in existing applications.
The following new Natural system functions are provided in this version:
| System Function | Description |
|---|---|
*MINVAL/*MAXVAL |
Evaluate the minimum/maximum value of all given operand values. |
*TRANSLATE |
Translate the operand to lower/upper case characters. |
*TRIM |
Remove leading and/or trailing blanks from a string. |
The following new Natural profile parameters are provided in this version:
| Profile Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
CP |
Defines the default code page for Natural data.
Note: |
CPCVERR |
Specifies whether a conversion error that occurs when converting from Unicode to code page or from code page to Unicode or from one code page to another code page results in a Natural error or not. |
CPOBJIN |
Specifies the code page of the batch input file
which is defined by the Natural profile parameter
CMOBJIN.
|
CPPRINT |
Specifies the code page of the batch output file
which is defined by the Natural profile parameter
CMPRINT.
|
CPSYNIN |
Specifies the code page of the batch input file
for commands which is defined by the Natural profile parameter
CMSYNIN.
|
CPRPC |
Specifies the name of the code page used by the EntireX Broker. |
DO |
Specifies how fields are to be interpreted for display on terminals that support bidirectional data. |
EMFM |
Activates/deactivates the Edit Mask Free mode at session startup. |
FDDM |
Defines five subparameters for the Natural system file for DDMs. |
FREEGDA |
Releases the GDA in Utility Activation. |
KCHECK |
Checks field declarations in a programming object against a set of critical Natural keywords. |
MASKCME |
Used to control Natural's compiler: to make the
MASK option compatible to MOVE EDITED.
|
MAXYEAR |
Allows valid year values of up to 9999 instead of 2699 for date and time values. |
MFSET |
Specifies whether multi-fetch is used to retrieve records from Adabas databases. |
NCFVERS |
Enables downward compatibility with Natural Versions lower than Version 6.1 and specifies the protocol version of the Entire Connection format file (.NCF) to be used. |
NENTRY |
Left/right alignment of numeric field entries. |
NOSSLPRX |
Specifies the domain(s) to be addressed directly, that is, not via the SSL proxy. |
PCHECK |
Used to control Natural's compiler: to check
parameters that are specified in a CALLNAT
statement.
|
PSIGNF |
Internal representation of positive sign of packed numbers. |
RCFIND |
Determines the action to be taken if Adabas
Response Code 113 (requested ISN not found) is returned during the execution of
a FIND statement processing loop.
|
RCGET |
Determines the action to be taken if Adabas
Response Code 113 (requested ISN not found) is returned during the execution of
a GET statement.
|
RTINT |
Specifies whether a running Natural application may be interrupted. |
SRETAIN |
Specifies that all sources have to be saved in their original encoding format. |
SSLPRX |
Specifies the URL of the (intranet) SSL proxy server through which all requests have to be routed. |
SSLPRXPT |
Specifies the port number of the SSL proxy. |
SRVWAIT |
Specifies the number of seconds the server is to wait for an RPC client request. |
SUBCHAR |
Substitution character for code page. |
SUTF8 |
Specifies the default format to be used when Natural sources are saved. |
THSEP |
Dynamic thousands separator. Enables or disables the use of thousands separators at compilation time. |
THSEPCH |
Thousands separator. Specifies the character to be used as a thousands separator at runtime. |
TQMARK |
Controls the translation of a quotation mark (") within a Natural text constant. |
WEBIO |
Specifies whether the terminal emulation or the new Natural Web I/O Interface, which supports Unicode, is used for input and output. |
The following new Natural session parameters are provided in this version:
| Session Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
DL |
Specifies the display length for an alphanumeric map field of format U. |
CPCVERR |
Specifies whether a conversion error that occurs when converting from Unicode to code page or from code page to Unicode or from one code page to another code page results in a Natural error or not. |
EMU |
Edit mask in Unicode. |
ICU |
Insertion character in Unicode. |
LCU |
Leading characters in Unicode. |
TCU |
Trailing characters in Unicode. |
The following new Natural system variables are provided in this version:
| System Variable | Description |
|---|---|
*BROWSER-IO |
Indicates that the application is running in a web browser. An application can run in a web browser via the Natural Web I/O Interface. |
*CODEPAGE |
Returns the IANA name of the code page currently used. |
*CURRENT-UNIT |
Contains the name of the currently executed unit. |
*LBOUND |
Contains the current lower boundary (index value) of an array for the specified dimension(s) (1, 2 or 3) or for all dimensions (* notation). |
*LINE |
Contains the number of the line currently executed in a Natural object. |
*LOCALE |
Contains the language and country of the current locale. |
*TP |
Contains the name of the TP subsystem under which Natural is running. |
*TPVERS |
Contains the name of the TP subsystem under which Natural is running. |
*TYPE |
Contains the type of the Natural object which is currently executed. |
*UBOUND |
Contains the current upper boundary (index value) of an array for the specified dimension(s) (1, 2 or 3) or for all dimensions (* notation). |
The following new Natural system variables are automatically created for
each PARSE statement issued.
| System Variable | Description |
|---|---|
*PARSE-COL |
Specifies the column where the parser is currently working at. |
*PARSE-LEVEL |
Specifies the level of currently nested elements. |
*PARSE-NAMESPACE-URI |
Specifies the namespace URI of the current element/attribute, if the element/attributes belong to a namespace. |
*PARSE-ROW |
Specifies the row where the parser is currently working at. |
*PARSE-TYPE |
Specifies the type of the delivered data. |
The following new Natural system commands are provided in this version:
| System Command | Description |
|---|---|
LIST ERR |
Displays the file information of error message(s) or error message containers of a library. |
LIST RES |
Displays the file information about resource object(s) of a library. |
RENAME |
Rename a Natural programming object.
Note: |
SYSEXV |
This command invokes the SYSEXV
application with examples of the new features of the current Natural
versions.
|
The following new Natural constants are provided in this version:
| Type of Constant | Description |
|---|---|
| Unicode text constant (U) | See Unicode Constants in the Programming Guide. |
| Unicode hexadecimal constant (UH) | See Unicode Hexadecimal Constants in the Programming Guide. |
The following new Natural utility is provided in this version:
| Utility | Description |
|---|---|
SYSAPI |
Used to locate application programming interfaces (APIs) provided by Natural add-on products. A user interface is only provided via SPoD. |
The utility SYSEXT provides the following new
application programming interfaces (APIs):
| API | Description |
|---|---|
USR1023N |
Convert
*TIMESTMP and other
variables containing time information into a different format.
|
USR2018N |
Read Natural object directory. |
USR2035N |
Set SSL parameter string for communication via RPC. |
USR2073N |
Ping or terminate an RPC server. |
USR2075N |
Terminate EntireX Broker Service. Used with Natural Remote Procedure Call (RPC). |
USR4003N |
Retrieve Natural stack information (alphanumeric). |
USR4004N |
Retrieve dynamic Natural profile parameters. |
USR4007N |
Get/set current value of profile parameter
SYNERR.
|
USR4201N |
Define a data area source. |
USR4206N |
List objects in a library and return directory
information. Avoids combined calls of the application programming interfaces
USR1055N (list objects in a library) and USR2018N
(read Natural object directory) in order to retrieve directory information.
|
USR4208N |
Read or write shared resource. |
USR4209N |
Return short name of subroutine. |
USR4210N |
Base64 conversion of alphanumeric and binary bytes. |
USR6001N |
Call external XSLT processor. |
USR6002N |
Get the current values of the internal counters
MADIO, MAINPR and MAXCL.
|
USR6006N |
Get path to system file. |
USR6202N |
Get and set value of an environment variable. |
USR6203N |
Get the path of a resource. Add and delete resources. |
USR6204N |
Set Natural profile parameter
PROGRAM.
|
USR6303N |
Retrieve Natural stack information (Unicode). |
