Data Type Conversion

 

 

Migrate Character Sets and Endianness

Challenges

 

Translating mainframe binary data types (like COMP), and typical data type conversions like these:

  • EBCDIC to ASCII
  • packed or zoned decimal values to binary integer
  • numbers to currency
  • European to ISO timestamps
  • floating point to numeric
  • big to little endian

traditionally requires separate tools and I/O passes and, in some cases, consultants. Going the other way (i.e., ASCII to packed) can be difficult.

Solutions

 

Data (and File) Type Conversion Only

IRI-Supported Data Type Groups

  • ASCII / C
  • EBCDIC MF
  • Dates
  • Composites
  • Multi-Byte
  • Packed Decimal
  • Numerics
  • EBCDIC RM
  • Timestamps
  • Single-Byte
  • Unicode
  • Zoned Decimal

 

IRI NextForm software converts data types as you migrate, replicate, or federate files and tables. Translate source fields from EBCDIC to ASCII, packed decimal to numeric, American to ISO timestamp, IP address to whole number, etc. Save time and money using NextForm to convert between more than 100 built-in (or custom-defined) data types.

NextForm also converts files and databases from one format to another. This is useful in application modernization, mainframe migrations, data replication, and ETL scenarios. With NextForm, you can translate a Micro Focus COBOL I-SAM file into a text file, LDIF to CSV, upgrade or leave Oracle, etc. NextForm can also: reformat records; manipulate field elements; filter, validate and scrub data; and, generate custom reports.

Data Migration, Transformation, and Reporting

The conversion of data types is only one of the many reformatting options in IRI CoSort data transformation product and the IRI Voracity data management platform.

CoSort's Sort Control Language (SortCL) program allows you to specify new data types and file formats as you:

  •    integrate and stage data in DW ETL operations
  •    migrate between applications, database, or off the mainframe
  •    replace slower shell or 3GL programs
  •    create custom detail, delta, and summary reports

Use SortCL to convert a fixed-length EBCDIC file to a CSV, ASCII, or XML file, while sorting, and change big endian data to little endian. Such consolidated processing saves design steps and run times when offloading and pre-sorting data for relational DB loads.

Indeed, SortCL programs transform data in other ways, too. They filter and scrub, sort and merge, join and aggregate, plus mask PII and reformat fields into multiple output targets -- and report -- all at once.

Contact us to discuss your use case. It is also possible to provide a customized data type conversion or comparison routine for special data forms.