Mainframe Sequential Files

Conversion and Processing of Line, Record, and Variable SAM Data

Overview
CLF/ELF
CSV
Excel
JSON
LDIF
LS-RS-VS
MF-ISAM
MFVL
Text
Variable blocked
Vision
VSAM
XML
Challenges

Line Sequential (LS), Record Sequential (RS), and Variable Sequential (VS) files are legacy format files that contain flat records and proprietary header, width, and terminator attributes. The files are incompatible with each other and with many other file formats and applications.

You need to migrate, process, secure, and/or replicate old data that comes in these file formats. There are very few software products that can process these outside of the mainframe environment. It would be time-consuming and expensive to create custom programs for transformation, reporting, or backup of LS/RS/VS files at the field level.

Solutions

IRI offers conversion functions for LS, RS, and VS files across various products. Select as needed:

Use IRI NextForm, to convert these files into other formats (e.g., CSV, ODBC, XML, text, etc.) or from other formats into LS/RS/VS. NextForm also supports field-level data type conversion and record layout remapping.

NextForm document definitions also work in SortCL-Program under IRI CoSort. Reuse metadata when upgrading to CoSort for fast data transformation and reporting.

SortCLProgram in CoSort can

Transform of data (e.g., sorting, joining, aggregating, calculating, etc.) in LS/RS/VS files
LS/RS/VS files to other file formats convert and create LS/RS/VS files from these formats
Report from LS/RS/VS file sources

with a simple 4GL for layout and manipulation definitions or a powerful, free GUI on an Eclipse basis.

Map one or more input files in LS/RS/VS format to and from other file formats. Create detail, summary, or delta reports.Change Data Capture and Slowly Changing Dimensions) from LS/RS/VS file sources. Pass pre-sorted, filtered, and converted subsets to BI tools, Database Loaders or other applications.

Use IRI FieldShield, to protect fields in productive LS/RS/VS files with encryption, masking, etc.

Use IRI RowGen, if you need test data in LS/RS/VS file formats. RowGen uses the same layout metadata as CoSort (SortCL) and NextForm, so that you can easily switch between test data generation and real data transformation.

Product links