In JCL for utilities (such as ZCERQUTL), how can I have a parm continue over multiple lines?

Products

• Alchemist
• TPX - Session Management
• Vman Session Management for z/OS

Issue/Introduction

In JCL for utilities (such as ZCERQUTL), how can I have a parm continue over multiple lines?

Environment

Release:
Component: ALCMST

Resolution

When your parm is too long to fit on one line, continuation on a second line or more can easily be defined. The continued parm line must start after column 16 or it is interpreted as an operand, which will usually cause a JCL error.

For example, this works:

----+----1----+----2----+----3----+----4----+----5----+
//         PARM='OENAME=######,ACTION=ARC,STATUS=(ANY),
//               PREFIX=PRFX.ALCSUP,AGE=30'                  
This doesn't:

----+----1----+----2----+----3----+----4----+----5----+
//         PARM='OENAME=######,ACTION=ARC,STATUS=(ANY),
//         PREFIX=PRFX.ALCSUP,AGE=30'         

This Frequently Asked Question applies to all supported releases of ESP Alchemist.