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RM Cobol 85 dat.file conversion

  • September 8, 2014
  • 17 replies
  • 0 views
D

Hi,

I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

  1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
    I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
  2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

Thank you in advance.

Regards,

weinberger

    17 replies

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    The best way I know of doing this is to write a simple RM Cobol program to create a text file from the RM Cobol indexed file. I've done this many times and loaded the text files into Excel successfully for our Customers. You need to know  the structure of the data in the indexed file and have access to the RM Cobol compiler (which we have if you don't). Once done it's easy to automate so you can create the text file yourself in the future.

    There is another way of doing it using a product called Relativity from the RM Cobol range of products. Relativity allows a real time look at your Cobol files using Excel etc. This is quite expensive and you would need help in setting it up. For a single file the first idea would seem to be the most cost-effective solution.

    Regards

    Bob at dualcs

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Unfortunately, COBOL file records do not have any internal information about the record layout, so to get information out of it with a COBOL program will always require access to a File Description.  Based on what you're saying, it sounds like the recover2 utility will work for you.  It will dump an indexed file to a sequential file. I'm looking at the documentation for recover2 in appendix G of the User's Guide, and I don't see any information about the format of the records that are placed into the sequential file.  It probably may not be a line sequential file, so the program that you use to process may need to be aware of that.

    If this is something that you'd like to pursue, write back and I'll supply some more details.

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Dear All,

    Micro Focus has a Routine named RMMFDataMigration to convert RM Files to MF Files.

    Then if you take this MF Files with Micro Focus Data Tools you can see the File information for every MF Files Converted.

    Then with this Micro Focus Data Tools you can converte to a sequential files and then bring it to you new System.

    OBS. You need To have  Visual Studio and Micro Focus Visual Cobol for Visual Studio to can do this.

     

    If you can send a RM Files to me I can show this to you.

    PJM

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    @dualcs: As I mentioned in my first post I am not a programmer and therefore programming is not an option for me. Maybe Relativity would be an option depending how expensive it is. I will take a look at it. Thanks and regards

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    @ MikeS: I already tried recover2 utility. I set an input and a drop file (.txt) with option NOSUB. And as a result I did get a dumped .txt-file with lots of figures and characters. But I don't know how to use this file any further. Thank you.

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    @Pedro: dl.dropboxusercontent.com/.../mles.dat

    Under this link you can find my RM-file for your demonstration. Thank you.

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Dear Weinberger,

    Enclosed you will find a figure that show all that I speak about RM Files Conversión. The space to send enclosed files is very very small and I can´t send the other figure to you. If you send to me your personal email I will send them to you.

    TKS

    PJM

    1 Attachments
    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Dear Weinberger,

    Here you are a part of your file converted...

    1 Attachments
    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Dear Pedro,

    Thank you for the files and sorry for my late reply. I am on holidays now :-)

    So you just used both RMMFDataMigration to convert RM Files to MF Files and Micro Focus Data Tools to see the File Information? Is this right?

    So the question for me is what to do with this result? To me I see a lot of figures. Where to import in which way? Do I understand you correctly that I have to convert the result-file with the MF Data Tools in a sequential file?

    Thank you again.

    Thomas Morrison
    • Thomas Morrison
    • Participating Frequently
    • September 12, 2014

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Dear Weinberger:

    Attempting to reverse engineer the data layout of any COBOL file, whether it is in RM indexed format, RM binary sequential format (as produced by recover2), or Micro Focus format is very, very tedious work.  Since you are not a programmer, I will not bore you with the details of why this is so unless you really wish to know.

    So some basic questions and facts:

    Do you have the source code for the programs?  If so, your work will be much, much easier.  If this application was developed 'in house' then probably somewhere the source code is stored.  It would be normal, but not necessary, for RM/COBOL source code to have file names with the extension ".CBL".  COBOL source code uses very English-like words.  Key words to be looking for would be "IDENTIFICATION DIVISION", "DATA DIVISION" "FILE-CONTROL" "FILE SECTION".  So, as a first order question to answer: Do you have the source code for the application?  It is definitely worth spending some time to try to find it.

    If the answer to this question is yes, then the easiest approach would be to use Relativity.  Relativity is a SQL engine for RM/COBOL and Micro Focus data files.  In my judgment (which may be a bit biased), the cost of licensing and using Relativity is far less than writing COBOL programs to extract data.  (I disagree with a previous comment claiming it is quite expensive, assuming you need only a single user version of Relativity.)

    But, if you don't have the source code for the application, is the application one that was purchased from a software vendor?  Is the software vendor still in business?  If so, can you get the relevant file descriptions from that vendor?  Or does the vendor already offer a Relativity-based solution?

    If the answer to all of these questions is no (no source, in-house developed program), then frankly rather than reverse engineer the data files, I would suggest extracting data from printed reports.  This is a bit crude, but in terms of expense it will be less costly and easier to maintain than attempting to reverse engineer the data layouts, which will require you (or your programmer) to decipher numbers that are stored using internal formats (i.e. not normal printable characters).  This would be days - perhaps weeks if the data of interest really is stored in multiple files - of work for an experienced programmer. 

    Tom Morrison
    Hill Country Software 

    Tom Morrison, Consultant, South Carolina, USA
    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Dear weinberger,

    YES. As I show to you is  posible to convert the RM-Files to MF Files. Now with the Micro Focus Data Tools is posible to convert this Mf Files to any format, in this case to convert to a Sequencial files that you can Read with Microsoft Excel.

    If you don´t have this Micro Focus tolos we have to study a way to convert all your files to your necessities.

    Regards,

    Pedro Juan Montero Bernales
    PJM Informatica Soluciones Globales
    Av. Ricardo Lyon 2034 Oficina 603
    Providencia- Santiago - Chile
    ( Telefono: ( 56-2) 2415-1583
    È Móvil : ( 56-9) 7637-8488
    e-mail : pjminformatica1@gmail.com 

    Juan Urraburu
    • Juan Urraburu
    • Participating Frequently
    • January 19, 2015

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Hi Weinberger,

    Here you have a link for the text version of your Cobol Indexed file https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1HKLO4DBdPqMHpGZU9rZVAxR1k/view?usp=sharing

    But as you see, you still need the File Description in order to use it.

    Did you find the File Description file for this file? something like MLES.FD maybe? If you can find that text file and share it, I can send you the data inside an Excel file.

    Regards,

    Juan Manuel Urraburu

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Hi Tom,

    Thanks for your post. It's been a while.

    We do have a lot of files with the extension cbl. But I don't know how to find out which file belongs to the file to be extracted, "mles.dat".

    The filename "mles" appears only once. There is no mles.cbl or similar.

    Do I need to the file wiht an identical filename but with the cbl-extension?

    Perhaps I will take a look at Relativity if this is clarified with the source code file. But I am not in programming and as the poster dualcs already mentioned would it be possible "need help in setting it up". So I am not sure if this programme is the right one for me.

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Dear All,

    It's been a while. Thank you all for your help and suggestions.

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Hi Juan,

    Thank you.

    Unfortunately there is no other mles-file to find. Just mles.dat.

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Just to avoid misunderstandings, is it possible to convert this file, e.g. with Relativity or Micro Focus Tools, not only in hexadecimal or similar but in characters? Or do I have then "only" a file with a lot of figures but cannot read it like a text?

    D

    Hi,

    I am having a RM/Cobol-85 dat-file (indexed file?) which data I need to have extracted in a readable way for analysis (e.g. MS Excel). But I am not a programmer and not familiar with RM/Cobol. I am just an end user of this application. Unfortunately our programmes are not maintenanced any more.

    We use RM/Cobol-application on a Windows 7 platform with MS-Office 2007.

    1. Is there a way or program for an end user to extract or copy all the data of the dat-file in an readable way to MS Excel or a text file?
      I heard about Record Editor but I don't know how to use it, e.g. what kind of file structure it is or what is a copybook.
    2. Or Is there a way to copy all the lines as text at once of the RM/Cobol-85 window? Now I am able to copy only one line of the opened RM/Cobol dat-file window. But there are hundreds of lines there to copy. I tried to find something in the "Properties for Runtime" dialog box that sets copy specifications. But cannot find anything there. But this would also be of help.

    Thank you in advance.

    Regards,

    weinberger

    Dear Pedro,

    Unfortunately we do not have the Micro Focus Data Tools.

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