I am not at all hostile to DFSORT, which I now prefer slightly to SYNCHSORT.
I am, however, hostile to the notion that I/O in a statement-level language is always inferior to that of DFSORT. Here both of my young programmers used a locate-mode READ-SET for the input records, examined each in its buffer, and an effectively asynchronous move-mode WRITE-TO a LOCATEd position in an output buffer for the selected records. Their JCL included appropriate BUFNO=, etc. (Interestingly, something very similar could be but in fact is almost never done in COBOL with a reusable C or PL/I driver.) I am of course familiar with production-control schemes. Production must be orderly, but in my experience bureaucratic controls alone do not reduce errors: They only diffuse responsibility. John Gilmore, Ashland, MA 01721 - USA ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
