The LOCALE option controls cultural environment processing, allowing you to choose an alternative set of collating rules based on a specified national language. For SORT/MERGE processing, the alternative collating applies to character (CH) fields. For INCLUDE/OMIT comparison processing, the alternative collating applies to character fields and hexadecimal constants compared to character fields.
MFX employs the callable services of IBM’s Language Environment for z/OS to collate data in a way that conforms to the language and conventions of a selected locale. A locale defines single and multi-character collating rules for a cultural environment. Numerous pre-defined locales are available.
NONE, the default setting for LOCALE, results in normal EBCDIC collating.
CURRENT directs MFX to use the locale active when MFX begins.
name is the name of a supplied or user-defined locale that is to be active during MFX processing. A locale name may be up to 32 characters and is not case sensitive. The locale that is active just before MFX processing begins will be restored when MFX processing completes. Table below contains a list of locales provided with the IBM National Language Resources Feature of Language Environment.
|
Locale Name |
Language |
Country |
|---|---|---|
|
C |
|
|
|
DA_DK |
Danish |
Denmark |
|
DE_CH |
German |
Switzerland |
|
DE_DE |
German |
Germany |
|
EL_GR |
Greek |
Greece |
|
EN_GB |
English |
United Kingdom |
|
EN_JP |
English |
Japan |
|
EN_US |
English |
United States |
|
ES_ES |
Spanish |
Spain |
|
FI_FI |
Finnish |
Finland |
|
FR_BE |
French |
Belgium |
|
FR_CA |
French |
Canada |
|
FR_CH |
French |
Switzerland |
|
FR_FR |
French |
France |
|
IS_IS |
Icelandic |
Iceland |
|
IT_IT |
Italian |
Italy |
|
JA_JP |
Japanese |
Japan |
|
NL_BE |
Dutch |
Belgium |
|
NL_NL |
Dutch |
Netherlands |
|
NO_NO |
Norwegian |
Norway |
|
PT_PT |
Portuguese |
Portugal |
|
SV_SE |
Swedish |
Sweden |
|
TR_TR |
Turkish |
Turkey |
- Make sure the JCL gives MFX access to the library that contains the loadable locale routines. For the supplied locales, these are the dynamically loadable routines in the IBM Language Environment SCEERUN library. For more information, see the IBM publication Language Environment for z/OS & VM Installation and Customization Guide, SC26-4817.
- If locale processing is used for fields specified in a SORT or MERGE control statement, VLTEST=1 will be forced on in addition to any other VLTEST options in effect. VLTEST=1 will cause MFX to terminate if a variable-length input record does not contain all SORT/MERGE control fields.
- Although locale processing can improve performance compared to external collating routines, it should be used only when necessary. Locale processing can significantly degrade SORT/MERGE and INCLUDE/OMIT performance compared to normal collating.
- An E61 exit cannot be used with locale processing.
- Locale processing requires additional main storage to support the use of Language Environment facilities. For those jobs that use locale, the below-the-line region size should be increased by 1MB to accommodate the storage needs of the IBM Language Environment modules.
- A single ampersand character (&) is not accepted by IEV90 and ASMA90 assemblers. If you want an ampersand in a locale name, use two (&&).