Running the Container Demonstration for the Visual COBOL Base Image

The container demonstration to create the Visual COBOL base image includes a shell script (bld.sh) to make the process of running the demonstration as easy as possible. This topic lists and describes the parameters that you can specify when running bld.sh.

When using bld.sh to create a base image for Visual COBOL you need to ensure that the relevant installation files and licenses are available in the same folder as bld.sh. These are:

The installable executable file for Visual COBOL Development Hub. This is setup_visualcobol_devhub_for_docker_8.0_platform.gz and is supplied in the container demonstration for the Visual COBOL Development Hub base image.
The appropriate license (.mflic or .xml) file for Visual COBOL Development Hub.
If you will be including Java support in the image, the relevant executable file to perform the installation of the JDK. You can get this file from your chosen JDK provider.

The command to execute the shell script to run the container demonstration for the Visual COBOL base image is as follows:

./bld.sh IacceptEULA  
         [dryrun]
         [esadmgid=admin-gid]
         [esadmuid=admin-uid]
         [esadminuser=admin-id]
         [hotfix=tar-file-name]
         [nojava | (java | oraclejava) [javaversion=java-version]]
         [login|nologin] 
         [logingid=login-gid]
         [loginid=login-id]
         [logingname=login-gname]
         [loginname=login-name]
         [notools]
         [odbc|odbc-dev]
         [package]
         [rmi]
         [settings]
         [verbose]

where the parameters are:

IacceptEULA

Indicates that you accept the Micro Focus End User License Agreement (EULA).

You must specify IacceptEULA to create a base image containing Visual COBOL.

dryrun

Indicates that you do not want bld.sh to run any Docker or podman commands. Use dryrun with the verbose parameter to display the Docker or podman commands without running them.

esadminuser=admin-id

Specifies the ID to be used for the Enterprise Server admin user.

esadmgid=admin-gid

Specifies the group ID to use for the Enterprise Server admin user.

esadmuid=admin-uid

Specifies the user ID to use for the Enterprise Server admin user.

hotfix=tar-file-name

This option is only for installing a Patch Update version. Specify the name of the installable executable .tar file as mentioned above, without the extension. For example: hotfix=setup_visualcobol_devhub_for_docker_8.0_patchupdate03_312109_ platform_x64.

java

Indicates that you want the image to include Java support provided by Adoptium's OpenJDK. Use the javaversion parameter to specify the version of Java that you want support for.

javaversion=java-version

When specified in conjunction with the oraclejava parameter, java-version specifies the Java version you want support for, which can be 8 or 9; otherwise, when specified in conjunction with the java parameter, java-version can be 8, 10-18.

login

Indicates that you want to create a login image. Using this option results in image that you can use to log in to (using any details specified by the logingid, loginid, logingname and loginname parameters). Once logged in to this image you can execute shell or Visual COBOL commands.

This option is useful if you are not adding any application files to a base image but want to be able to use Visual COBOL commands from it.

When you specify login the tag of the image created is suffixed with "_login".

logingid=login-gid

Specifies the group ID to use for the user specified by the loginid parameter.

loginid=login-id

Specifies the user ID to use for the login image.

logingname=login-gname

Specifies the group name to use for the user specified by the loginid parameter.

loginname=login-name

Specifies the user name to use for the user specified by the loginid parameter.

nojava

Indicates that you do not want Java to be installed in the base image. You might want to use this parameter if your system already includes a number of different versions of Java and you don't want to introduce another version unnecessarily.

nologin

Indicates that you do not want to create a login image. You would typically want to use this option when creating an image that contains an application rather than just a base image for Visual COBOL. This is the default.

notools

Indicates that you do not want the image to contain the IP tools (such as ping and netcat) that are included in the image by default. Use this option if you do not need the tools and want to minimize the size of the image.

odbc|odbc-dev

Specifies that the odbc run-time library or the odbc developer tools library is installed.

oraclejava

Indicates that you want the image to include Java support provided by the Oracle JDK. Use the javaversion parameter to specify the version of Java that you want support for.

package

Indicates that you want to rebuild the COBOL application in this image.

rmi

Indicates that you want to remove any previously-created Visual COBOL base images. Specifying rmi results in the execution of a number of docker rmi --force or podman rmi --force commands to remove all Visual COBOL base images.

settings

Causes the settings that will be used for various properties of the image to be displayed on-screen. Properties that are displayed include the names of the installable file and the license file for Visual COBOL, the details to be used for the Enterprise Server admin user, and the details to be used for the login image. Specifying settings does not cause an image to be created.

verbose

Causes Docker or podman commands to be displayed on-screen as they are executed.