Q.1.1.2 POSIX Environment

The ACUCOBOL-GT development system can be run in HP e3000 COBOL compatibility mode in MPE/iX environment, under MPE and the POSIX shell. This section discusses some basic issues related to the installation, startup, and running of ACUCOBOL-GT under the POSIX shell on HP e3000 platforms.

To install ACUCOBOL-GT on your system, you must have MPE/iX release 5.0 or later. The installation procedure, including the installation of license files, is described in detail in the Getting Started booklet, section 1.3.4, "HP e3000 Machines Running MPE/iX." The installation procedure gives the exact command line syntax you should use, first to get from the MPE level to the POSIX shell, and then to install and run ACUCOBOL-GT. In addition, useful information on printing from the POSIX shell is included.

To get your existing COBOL applications running with ACUCOBOL-GT, you need to recompile the source. The name of the ACUCOBOL-GT compiler executable is "ccbl" and you invoke it with the following command. (For complete information on invoking the compiler, see Book 1, User's Guide, section 2.1.)

ccbl filename.cbl

The resulting object file has the same base name as the source file plus the extension ".acu". Unlike the native HP e3000 COBOL system, the ACUCOBOL-GT object does not require linking.

To run your program, invoke it with ACUCOBOL-GT runtime (it is named "runcbl"). To invoke it, enter the following command. (For complete information on invoking the runtime, see Book 1, User's Guide, section 2.2.)

runcbl filename.acu

Any programs that are called during execution are loaded dynamically at runtime by "runcbl". Subprograms written in C may be linked into the runtime system directly, and then called by a COBOL program using the CALL verb. See Appendix C for details regarding linking a C program into the runtime.

There are many compile and runtime options that you can also include in the command arguments to compile or execute your ACUCOBOL-GT program. You can view the full list of the available options by entering the following command.

ccbl -help

Note: You should use the command line options in lieu of the HP e3000 COBOL $CONTROL directives. See section Q.3, "ACUCOBOL-GT Preprocessor for HP e3000 COBOL," for a table referencing the HP e3000 COBOL $CONTROL directives to the ACUCOBOL-GT command line options for the compiler and the runtime.

For detailed descriptions of the ACUCOBOL-GT compiler and runtime, including all of the command line options and utility programs, see Book 1, User's Guide, Chapters 2 and 3. Book 1 also includes sections on how to get help and how to handle compilation and runtime problems (User's Guide Chapter 1, section 1.7 and its subsections).