Rocket® COBOL

Created On:  19 September 2012 Problem: Customer is using Visual COBOL for Visual Studio 2.0 to create a native COBOL application that uses embedded SQL to access a SQL Server database through ODBC.  The ODBC DSN has been setup to use the SQL Server driver and the Text Connect button is successful in the ODBC Administrator.  When the customer starts OpenESQL Assistant in Visual Studio it correctly displays the list of available DSNs and when they are expanded the list of tables is also displayed.  When a table is checked and the Assistant tries to display the columns it displays an error that no columns are defined for the table.  What is the problem? Resolution: Check to see if the ODBC DSN is using an out of date SQL Server ODBC driver. You should upgrade to use SQL Server Native Client 10.0 or later instead of the standard driver for SQL Server. What happened is that in Visual COBOL 2.0 OpenESQL changed the default behavior to mainframe and the Assist

Created On:  20 September 2012 Problem: Because of missing symbolic links to the multi-threaded Xerces shared objects, you will receive the following load error when executing threaded programs that use Xerces on UNIX platforms:Load error : file 'cobrtxml_t.so'error code: 198, pc=0, call=1, seg=0198 Load failure (No such file or directory)orLoad error : file 'cobrtxml64_t.so'error code: 198, pc=0, call=1, seg=0198 Load failure (No such file or directory)This issue occurs both with 32-bit and 64-bit programs. Resolution: Create missing symbolic links (libxerces-c_t.so, libxerces-c_t.so.28, libxerces-c64_t.so, libxerces-c64_t.so.28) to multi-threaded Xerces shared objects (libxerces-c_t.so.28.0, libxerces-c64_t.so.28.0) provided in the product. Logged in as the root user : cd $COBDIR/libln -s libxerces-c_t.so.28.0 libxerces-c_t.soln -s libxerces-c_t.so.28.0 libxerces-c_t.so.28ln -s libxerces-c64_t.so.28.0 libxerces-c64_t.soln -s libxerces-c64_t.so.28.0 libxerces-c64_t.so.28

Created On:  19 September 2012 Problem: In certain instances CTF traces are not generated as expected.  This can be caused by mftrace being set somewhere else in the environment variables and sometimes this can be hard to find. Resolution: Stop the ES Region Open the Enterprise Developer command prompt and type SET MFTRACE_CONFIG=C:\\LOGS\\CTF.CFG next MFTRACE_LOGS=C:\\LOGS next CASSTART /RCICSSERV If CICSSERV is the region name.  Recreate and see if log files are generated now. To Stop the region when you start this way you must stop using the following command: CASSTOP /RCICSSERV * C:\\LOGS must exist and CTF.CFG must exist within the C:\\LOGS directory. Incident #2585243 Old KB# 36358#COBOL

Created On:  10 October 2012 Problem: How can I improve the performance of my EZASOKET CICS application deployed to Enterprise Server? Resolution: By default the CICS CSKL listener will put out messages to the console when a client application connects to run a transaction:121010 16482581      12472 EZATEST  CASOP0000I 01 of 02 From (,,CSKL) EZY1325I 10/10/12 16:48:25 START SUCCESSFUL TRANID=EZT1 PARTNER INET  121010 16482601      12472 EZATEST  CASOP0000I 02 of 02 From (,,CSKL) ADDR=127.0.0.1 PORT=  8087With many clients these messages can be an overhead. Using the EZAC transaction it is possible to suppress the generation of these messages. If you run EZAC ALT CICS you can configure this as per the screenshot below. Incident #2587952 Old KB# 36428#COBOL

Created On:  17 September 2012 Problem: I have a .NET managed code application compiled in Visual COBOL 2.0 which is using the PC_PRINTER_OPEN library call to print a document.  When making the call the application is setting the flags parameter to 8 which is supposed to cause it to print in landscape mode instead of portrait but it appears to be ignored and it prints in portrait anyway.  What is the problem? Resolution: There is a known problem in Visual COBOL when trying to set landscape mode using PC_PRINTER_OPEN in managed code.The flag will be ignored. This has been fixed but will not be available until Visual COBOL 2.2. The problem only exists in managed code as it prints in landscape mode fine in native code. Also, there is a workaround for the problem by calling PC_PRINTER_SET_DEFAULTS to change the orientation to landcape mode before the PC_PRINTER_OPEN call is done. This assumes that the printer you are opening in PC_PRINTER_OPEN is t

Created On:  19 September 2012 Problem: Customer has a Net Express native code application that uses the Net Express OLE Domain class library support to program Excel OLE Automation in COBOL.  Customer tried to move this into a .NET managed code program in Visual COBOL and it doesn't compile.  How can he use Excel OLE Automation from within a managed code program?The following code works in Net Express: $set ooctrl( P)ENVIRONMENT DIVISION. INPUT-OUTPUT SECTION. FILE-CONTROL. ******************************************************************class-control.MSExcel is class "$OLE$Excel.Application".*****************************************************************data division.working-storage section.01 WS-CSVFILE  pic x(30).01 WS-XLSFILE  pic x(30).01 WS-PASSWORD  pic x(20).01 ExcelObject   object reference.01 WorkBooksCollection object reference.01 Workbook object reference.01 WorkSheets object reference.01 Worksh

Created On:  24 September 2012 Problem: This error has been encountered when attempting to install Application Server for Net Express 4.0 on a Windows Server 2003 machine.  The 16-bit components of the InstallShield software used for installation of old software may manifest this error on operating systems where the creation of short file names has been disabled (eg. by setting the NtfsDisable8dot3NameCreation registry value to 1).  To this end, the problem may occur with other older Micro Focus products as well. Resolution: This problem may be solved by moving the setup file to a location which does not use long spacey names in its path components (eg. the root of drive C) and running it from there. If this does not solve the problem, a change to the above registry value is usually required.However, the problem is usually resolved in the first instance by running the setup file from the root of drive C. Incident #2592909 Old KB# 36366#COBOL

Created On:  08 October 2012 Problem: How do I get the DMPAPER parameter for custom paper size - in this case it is 9x12? Resolution: With reference to the PC_PRINTER_DEFAULT_PROPERTIES (which sets one or more of the properties of the default printer for all PC_PRINTER_ routines), please set the P-PAPERSIZE flag to 0 - which Microsoft define as the custom setting.  Once this has been done, you can add your own values to P-PAPERLENGTH and P-PAPERWIDTH, to the nearest millimeter, to define your own custom page size. Incident #2595190 Old KB# 36413#COBOL

Created On:  25 September 2012 Problem: A Vision version 4 file is about 5 GB total size with 37 million records.  It has two keys and there is a need to specify an existing field as another key.  A COBOL program was created to read the existing file and write to the new file.  That program executed very slowly.  It had not finished after running for over a day.  The file is used for a batch process that must run every day so a faster method is needed. Resolution: The vutil -unload and -load options will produce much faster results in moving the data from the old file to the new file.  First, unload the data into a binary sequential file using:      vutil -unload -b originalfile tempfile Next create the new empty file with an OPEN OUTPUT from a COBOL program.  Next, after you have an empty file with the new definition load the data with:      vutil -load -b temptfile newfile Lastly rename the

Created On:  03 October 2012 Problem: Customer is converting from Server Express 5.1 on AIX to Visual COBOL Dev Hub 2.1 on AIX.He is using a cobconfig.cfg file that sets the run-time tunable multi_close_limit=10.This does not cause a problem under Server Express but under Dev Hub 2.1 it causes an error in the config file handling.Is this tunable still supported? Resolution: The multi_close_limit tunable was originally introduced because of a problem where the runtime ran out of file handles when repeatedly opening and closing the same file, in certain circumstances. The runtime was changed to allow re-use of file handles for equivalent access modes. The support for the multi_close_tunable was disabled in Visual COBOL 2.1 but it has actually been unsupported since about Server Express 2.2.Removing the tunable from the cobconfig file will resolve the problem. Incident #2594590 Old KB# 36397#netexpress#ServerExpress#COBOL#VisualCOBOL

Created On:  02 October 2012 Problem: Is Net Express compatible with Windows 8 and Windows 2012 Server? Resolution: Net Express and Server for COBOL products do not support Windows 8 or Windows Server 2012. Micro Focus will review this situation again in July 2013. Customers intending to deploy on this platform should do so using the Visual COBOL product line which supports Windows 8 deployment; Windows Server 2012 support is expected to be available later this year (2012). Old KB# 36391#netexpress#COBOL#VisualCOBOL

Created On:  21 September 2012 Problem: Read-only Entry Fields used to allow their foreground or background colors to be modified. ACUCOBOL-GT Runtime version 8.1.0 stops this behavior and leaves the read-only field gray. Resolution: This change was made to follow Windows standards and was implemented with ECN-3699 released in 8.1.0. Since ACUCOBOL-GT 9.0, this implementation can be turned off so that applications may be customized as usual. Set the following configuration variable in cblconfi file: ECN-3699 0 The value "0" turns the ECN off, value "1" activates the ECN and entry-fields remain gray. Incident #2131301 Old KB# 36363#910#colours#colors#9.1#COBOL#Color#customizing#customize#colour#archive

Created On:  08 October 2012 Problem: Customer is using Visual COBOL for Visual Studio and needs to dynamically upload a file to an ftp site using the .NET Framework classes.  Can you provide an example of how this can be done? Resolution: Here is an example of uploading a file to an ftp site using Visual COBOL for Visual Studio managed code and the .NET Framework classes. $set ilusing"System.Net"$set ilusing"System.IO" program-id. Program1 as "testftp.Program1".data division.working-storage section.01 cFtpWebRequest type System.Net.FtpWebRequest.01 cFtpWebResponse type System.Net.FtpWebResponse.01 cFileInfo type FileInfo.01 fileContents type Byte occurs any.01 cFileStream type FileStream.01 writer type Stream.procedure division.try   set cftpWebRequest to type FtpWebRequest::Create(new type Uri("ftp://ftp.microfocus.com/testfile.txt")) as type FtpWebRequest   set cFtpWebRequest::Method to type "System.Ne

Created On:  25 September 2012 Problem: The original source file for the program has been lost.  Can the source code be extracted from the compiled object? Resolution: If the object was compiled for source level debugging then yes, Micro Focus engineers can extract the source.  To check the progam, execute it in debug (wrun32 -d programname or runcbl -d programname depending on platform).  If you can see the lines of the source then decompiling is possible. Your Account Manager can provide information on the cost and availability for such services. n/a Old KB# 36374#decompileundebug

Created On:  02 October 2012 Problem: Does Visual COBOL support the Net Express WINDOW1 preprocessor for ACU type popup windows for character applications?  For example: The following works in Net Express 5.1: $set preprocess(window1)  working-storage section. 78 note-height value 16. 78 note-width value 41. 78 no-of-chars value note-height * note-width. 01 note-window pic x(10).  01 dummy pic x.  01 note-data value all "- wallpaper ".       03 note-char pic x occurs no-of-chars.  screen section. 01 input-data highlight.       03 line 4 column 6 value " Accept and Display positions ".       03 line 5 column 6 value " are relative to the top left ".       03 line 6 column 6 value " corner of the window. ".       03 pic x using dummy.  01 note-screen pic x(no-

Created On:  02 October 2012 Problem: Customer is converting an application created using Net Express and Oracle Pro*COBOL to Visual COBOL managed code using OpenESQL.In Pro*COBOL they could use the following statement to change the date format of date fields returned in SQL queries:EXEC SQL ALTER SESSION SET NLS_DATE_FORMAT = 'MM-DD-YYYY' END-EXEC.Is there an equivalent method in Visual COBOL using OpenESQL? Resolution: Starting in Visual COBOL 2.1 several SQL directives have been added to control the returned formats of SQL Date and Time fields. Please see Visual COBOL documentation under Data Access, Database Access > Reference > OpenESQL > Compiler directives for full details of these directives.DATE Controls the reformatting of date values in output parameters and in input parameter character host variables when DETECTDATE is also specified. TIMEControls the reformatting of date values in output parameters and in input parameter character host variables when

Created On:  03 October 2012 Problem: Server for COBOL (formerly known as Application Server for Net Express) was using a different license mechanism and networked licensing (ASLMFNET). Is it possible to set up a similar networked licensing with COBOL Server 2.1 or Enterprise Server 2.1? Resolution: Here are the steps to set up networked licensing with COBOL Server 2.1 to run native (non .NET) applications. [Server side]1. Install COBOL Server 2.1 on the server2. Install the license3. Copy mfcesd.exe (MF CES Daemon) and mfcesdchk.exe (this checks if MF CES Daemon is running)    a. In 32-bit Windows – from C:\\Program Files\\Common Files\\SafeNet Sentinel\\Sentinel RMS License Manager\\WinNT to C:\\Program Files\\Micro Focus\\COBOL Server\\bin    b. In 64-bit Windows – from C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Common Files\\SafeNet Sentinel\\Sentinel RMS License Manager\\WinNT to C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Micro Focus\\COBOL Server\\

Created On:  18 September 2012 Problem: Customer has COBOL application that resides on a network share. He is starting the application from within a Windows batch file that also resides on the network share.When his application starts it does a call to "CBL_GET_CURRENT_DIR" to return the name of the folder from which the application was started.The application and batch file are on \\\\server1\\myfolder.When the batch file starts I get the following error:        '%1' CMD.EXE was started with the above path as the current directory. UNC paths are not supported. Defaulting to Windows directory.'and the program name cannot be found.Why is this occurring? Resolution: The problem is that Windows does not allow for a .bat file to have a network share as its current directory so it automatically changes it to the Windows folder for the local drive. This will work if you map a drive letter to the UNC name in which case the drive letter and folder will

Created On:  21 September 2012 Problem: There is a known issue when installing or running Micro Focus products after having previously uninstalled the runtime product Server for COBOL 5.0. When attempting to start, for example, Net Express or run a Net Express application, you may encounter the error ‘Micro Focus License Manager service is not running’. You may also be unable to view license information in the License Management Configuration tool. This is caused by having installed runtime licenses in the previous installation of Server for COBOL 5.0. This affects registry permissions rendering them inaccessible to subsequent installations of Micro Focus products.This issue was subsequently addressed and fixed in version 5.1 of Server for COBOL. Resolution: 1. Download and decompress the attachment FIXREG.ZIP into a temporary folder.2. From an administrator's command prompt navigate to the temporary folder and run FIXREG.BAT3. Once these steps have been carried out the iss

Created On:  05 October 2012 Problem: I look in $COBDIR/bin and I see the "cob" command, but I also see "cob32" and "cob64".   If I want to compile in 32-bit mode, should I use "cob32"?   Likewise, should I use "cob64" for 64-bit mode? Resolution: The intention is that end-users will use the basic "cob" command under all circumstances.  The "cob" command will notice the active cobmode at the time, then invoke either "cob32" or "cob64" behind the scenes as appropriate. The COBOL system is actively operating in one mode or another at any one time.  The current mode can be revealed by entering the "cobmode" command. The mode can be affected by setting the COBMODE environment variable.  For example:  $ export COBMODE=32  $ cobmode Effective Default Working Mode: 32 bit  $ export COBMODE=64  $ cobmode Effective Default Working Mode: 64 bit The mode can also be affected by various flags or options of the "cobmode"

Created On:  21 September 2012 Problem: An ACUCOBOL program running on Linux gets the following error message: "Missing required termcap function `cm' in entry for `dumb'" Resolution: As the program is run via Thin Client, it's possible that the environments may be different between server users. Here's an easy way to determine the environment in which the runtime is running: Use a command-line instruction like this to determine the environment from the user's prompt: env > env-from-prompt.txtThen, run this code from within the runtime, using C$SYSTEM: MOVE "env > env-from-runtime.txt" TO WS-CMD-LINE CALL "C$SYSTEM" USING WS-CMD-LINE,            CSYS-SHELL        GIVING EXIT-STATUSAt the end, compare the two .txt files. In this particular case, this comparison showed a mismatch between the two TERM environment variables: TERM=xterm (prompt environment) TERM=dumb(Thin client envir

Created On:  29 August 2012 Problem: A Visual COBOL Windows Forms application has a form on which a combo box control has been placed.  The combo box is statically populates with a list of strings.  The application retrieves data from an indexed file and needs to search the entries in the combo box to compare them with the value of one of the fields in the data record. When it finds a match it needs to set the current index of the combo box to the position within the combo box where the compare was true.  How can this be done? Resolution: Something like the following should work:      01 compareField    string.      01 emp-type          pic x(20)  value "Full Time".           set compareField to emp-field           set comboBox1::SelectedIndex to comboBox1::FindStringExact(compareField::TrimEnd(' '))

Created On:  24 August 2012 Problem: Program is executing a COBOL SEARCH statement but it appears to be failing on a data match that is definately in the table.What could be wrong?The program looks like: 01  ERROR-MSG                    PIC  X(28) VALUE SPACES.         01  ERR-IO-STATUS              PIC  X(02) VALUE SPACES.                                                                         

Created On:  07 September 2012 Problem: How to improve the performance of an AcuConnect Thin Client application. Resolution: In general two are the most important factors in performance terms when executing Thin Client applications, the application and the network latency, rather than bandwidth, latency is almost always the cause for poor thin client display performance, increasing the bandwidth does not necessarily reduce latency. In fact, when a client sends a request to acurcl, it just makes the connection via a socket, once a client is connected to the child runtime, acurcl is never again utilized for that client except during the runtime shutdown, in this case, during the execution of the application, all the performance depends on the speed of the network. The above points to the fact that the memory requirements are those for the runtime, which are minimum. A thin client program is less affected by the network latency if it has fewer calls that require a response. Re

Created On:  31 August 2012 Problem: Customer copied their Visual COBOL Windows Forms solution to another development machine with a different screen resolution.  The Form size and controls are not the same (lined up etc.). Is it the Form's AutoScaleMode property that controls this?Original developer is using a resolution of 1980 x 1080 and the second machine is 1680 x 1050. Will this also be an issue when deployed on end user machines? Resolution: Yes, it is the AutoScaleMode property of the Form that controls how the Forms and their Controls will be scaled if the application is run on a system that has a different screen resulution or uses a different default font. You can read about this at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms229605.aspx: A Forms AutoScaleMode property is set to inherit by default, which means use the mode specified in the Forms parent.  If there is no parent then this defaults to no scaling. You should try setting this prop