Micro Focus Studio Enterprise Edition Test Server > Programming > Data Access > File Handling > Working with Data Files > File Conversion Utilities > DFCONV Batch File Conversion > Operation > The DFCONV call batch interface

The DFCONV call batch interface

Calling the Data File Converter from a COBOL program

If a profile for a conversion exists, you can invoke the Data File Converter to do the conversion using the following interface:

call dfconv using dfconv-params

where:

 01 dfconv-params   PIC X(195).

dfconv-params contains the following parameters. These must be separated by spaces in the call, and file names that include spaces should be put in straight quotation marks.

profile-filename: The name of the profile file containing the details of the data file conversion.
-d: Optional. Stops information about the call being displayed in the console.
input-filename: The name of the input file. Optional, but must have a value if you want to specify output-filename.
output-filename: Optional. The name of the output file. You must also specify a value for input-filename.

If you specify file names in the parameter fields as well as in the profile file, those in the parameter fields take precedence.

On return from the Data File Converter, RETURN-CODE is set to non-zero if an error occurred, and the error number is returned in the first two characters of dfconv-params.

Calling the Data File Converter from a non-COBOL program

The Data File Converter can be called from a non-COBOL program using an entry point DFCONVC, provided within the Data File Converter .dll. The dfconv-params parameters are space terminated as for the COBOL call but the parameter list is NULL terminated.