Follow-up on my own post: It turns out when there are stray non-text characters in the original file, "cp" then thinks it is "binary" format and so copies it verbatim with no translation, hence no conversion or line-end characters in the Unix fle.
I was initially unaware of the non-text characters in the source file. When I corrected that issue, all went as expected and "cp" worked as documented. Apologies for wasting bandwidth. Peter From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Farley, Peter Sent: Friday, October 17, 2025 3:49 PM To: [email protected] Subject: z/OS Unix "cp" conversion options I am trying to copy a regular z/OS file consisting of RECFM=VBA,LRECL=8196 text records (CCSID IBM1047) into a Unix file converted to CCSID ISO8859-1 like this: cp -O c=ISO8859-1 "//'TSOUSER.DATA.FILE'" /u/tsouser/DATAFILE.txt Sometimes this works, sometimes it does not, and I cannot figure out what is different when it does not work. When it fails, I just get the IBM1047 character data in the Unix file with no line endings. Environment variable settings are: _BPXK_AUTOCVT=ON _CEE_RUNOPTS='FILETAG(AUTOCVT,AUTOTAG) POSIX(ON)' _TAG_REDIR_ERR=txt _TAG_REDIR_IN=txt _TAG_REDIR_OUT=txt Am I forced to use an "iconv" here after using "cp" without using the "-O -c=ISO8859-1" option? Is the "A" in RECFM=VBA messing me up? It is easily possible for me to create the VBA file as VB instead, but do I need to do that? Peter -- This message and any attachments are intended only for the use of the addressee and may contain information that is privileged and confidential. If the reader of the message is not the intended recipient or an authorized representative of the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately by e-mail and delete the message and any attachments from your system. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
