No there is no way for an unauthorized application to test it but, more important, as Jim M alluded, there is no reason to do so.
The actual bit to check would have been CVTBFPH which looks for the hardware being available (rather than CVTBFP which looks for the software being available). Use of all 16 floating point regs is supported unconditionally on all supported releases. That was not true prior to z/OS 2.1 (although if running on a "real machine" it was true since AFPRs are part of base z Architecture). It remains a fact that if you don't need more than 4 FPRs (and you don't need FPCR or anything other than the "old" hex floating point instructions) that you should limit yourself to FPRs 0/2/4/6 to save a few cycles with respect to status saving and restoring. Peter Relson z/OS Core Technology Design ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN