ITEM: E8778L
Character translation from EBCDIC to ASCII
Question:
Communication is between a Mainframe (TSO) to a RS/6000, Model 370
running on AIX 3.2.4. I want to know how to do character translation
from EBCDIC to ASCII. I want to do everything except Packed Decimal.
I am receiving the data over LU6.2 (SNA) and want to convert it using
C subroutine calls.
Response:
Customer was confused about use of obsolete NLXIN that has been replaced
by iconv routines. He also wanted to know how to change the EBCDIC/ASCII
conversion tables for use by these conversion routines and I will answer
this question first.
To make your own EBCDIC-ASCII conversion tables, modify ones included
with AIX.
-----------------------------
1. mkdir $HOME/iconvTable
mkdir $HOME/iconvTable/mine
cd $HOME/iconvTable/mine
cp -p $LOCPATH/IBM-037_IBM-850_src ./037850.x
cp -p $LOCPATH/IBM-850_IBM-037_src ./850037.x
2. Edit these source files as appropriate, for example:
When I tn3270 to VM I observe that the conversions for AIX
give some strange conversions for the characters \^ [ ] since some
versions of telnet or ftp or mail manage to send non-037 codes
for the ebcdic. The following table shows what is happening.
tn3270 ftp,mail
sends send
IBM-850 IBM-037 "whatever"
symbol ascii ebcdic ebcdic
------ ------- ------- --------
\^ 5E B0 5F (Logical Not)
[ 5B BA AD (y acute capital)
] 5D BB BD (umlaut accent)
If I want these characters (however they are sent) to be displayed
correctly, the following will accomplish that objective. In the
IBM-037_IBM-850_src file:
replace this with this
------------ -----------
0x5F 0xAA 0x5F 0x5E
0xAD 0xED 0xAD 0x5B
0xBD 0xF9 0xBD 0x5D
This means, of course, that AA(Logical Not), ED(y acute capital),
and F9(umlaut accent) cannot now be translated correctly by any
program using this conversion table (tn3270, tn -e3270).
3. Having changed the source files to your liking, you must generate
new conversion tables by:
genxlt \< 037850.x > ../IBM-037_IBM-850
genxlt \< 850037.x > ../IBM-850_IBM-037 (not needed, this example)
4. In the window that you will use this new conversion, make a change
in environment by:
export LOCPATH=$HOME ( normally this is /usr/lib/nls/loc )
5. Now run the application that is to use the new conversion in the
window with the new LOCPATH.
Below I have included an example EBCDIC/ASCII conversion program:
-----------------------------------------------------------------
/* ebcasc.c */
/* IBM-037 for EBCDIC (U.S.English) */
/* IBM-850 for En_US */
/* ISO8859-1 for en_US */
/* Execute by: */
/* cc -liconv -o ebcasc ebcasc.c */
/* ebcasc */
/* */
/* This is a very simple routine that demonstrates how */
/* to use the EBCDIC/ASCII conversion subroutines. */
/* */
/* You will need to read more about iconv routines in */
/* InfoExplorer or you may choose to use ConsultLine to */
/* modify this sample program to use your way of reading */
/* data and make this routine safe enough to be trusted. */
/* This program is only intended to illustrate the use */
/* of the iconv subroutine calls. */
\#include \
\#include \
main(int argc, char *argv[])
{ iconv_t cd;
char inBuf[1024]={'a','b','c','d'}, outBuf[1024]={'A', 'B', 'C', 'D'};
char *i, *o, *ip, *op;
size_t iLeft, oLeft;
size_t ii;
cd = iconv_open("IBM-037", "IBM-850");
if (cd == -1) exit(0);
strcpy(inBuf, ".\<(+!");
iLeft = 5;
oLeft = 5;
ip = inBuf;
op = outBuf;
ii = iconv(cd, &ip, &iLeft, &op, &oLeft);
printf("IBM-037 vs IBM-850\\n");
printf(" %s vs %s\\n", inBuf, outBuf);
iconv_close(cd);
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FONT size=2Support Line: Character translation from EBCDIC to ASCII ITEM: E8778L
BRDated: November 1993 Category: N/A
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