Emulations of Mainframe Utilities

This section describes the mainframe emulation utilities. You can invoke these utilities in a JCL jobstream or REXX exec by using the same program names, data sets and commands as on the mainframe. The mainframe utilities emulated by MSS are:

These names are defined as aliases for the equivalent MSS utility.
Note: Input files are no longer optional, and it is possible to catalog a file without creating a physical file. To help prevent JES failures because of an apparent missing input file, you can use the MFJ_INPUTDS_ERROR=N environment variable. When it is specified, an input file for a JCL step is considered as optional and most utilities and user programs treat missing input files as though they were present but empty. Some utilities, such as SORT, still check for a physical file and generate and error if it is not found.

This section describes the special considerations that apply when you use these utilities in a MSS environment. It does not include information on behavior that is the same in mainframe and MSS environments. For full information on the mainframe utilities referred to in this section, see the relevant IBM documentation.

Note:

If you wish to debug programs invoked by IKJEFT01, you must specify its equivalent MSS utility, IDAEFT01, as the program to debug.