Setting bounds

In CHAR, HEX and LHEX display formats, you can limit the columns that are searched by the CHANGE, EXCLUDE and FIND commands by setting left and right bounds. There are two methods of setting these bounds.

Method 1:

  1. On the Command line, enter 
    BOUNDS col1 col2
    (see BOUNDS primary command for information about the parameters of the BOUNDS command).
Note: This method is very quick but does not give you any visual feedback as to where the boundaries lie.

Method 2:

  1. In the prefix area of any record, enter BND.

    A new row is inserted into the display, showing a left angle bracket (<) and, if previously set, a right angle bracket (>).

    File Manager Edit USERID.FMDATA(DATA1)
       Col 1          Insert length 7996                           Format CHAR
       ----+----1----+----2----+----3----+----4----+----5----+----6----+----7-
000025 02Tyrone Dallas       Developer     92  Smith Street    Belmont
BND    <                             >
000026 02Rod Turnbull        Manager       184 Alexander Dve   Swan View

    If no bounds have previously been set, the left bracket appears in the first column of your records. If bounds have already been set, the left and right brackets appear in their pre-set columns.

  2. Change the bracket positions to suit your needs, by overtyping existing brackets and typing in a left and, optionally, a right bracket.
  3. Press Enter or use a function key to scroll through your data. The bounds are updated.
Note: You can display as many bounds lines as you want, which allows you to insert them at convenient locations while you are editing. When the Enter key is pressed, the most recently changed bounds line is processed to reset the boundaries. If you change more than one bounds line before pressing Enter, the lowermost of the changed bounds lines is processed.

Regardless of which method you used to set the bounds, you can reset the bounds to their default by entering the BOUNDS command without any parameters (equivalent to BOUNDS 1 max_record_length).

To remove a bounds line from the display, enter D in the prefix area of the line. To remove all bounds lines from the display, enter RESET in the Command line.

Note: Removing the bounds lines from the display does not remove the actual bounds.