Printing Line Data on a Print Server Printer
This example shows how you can print a data file developed for a line printer on a page printer without altering the data. The example compares the effects of line printer controls with the corresponding controls in the PPFA commands and subcommands. PRINTLINE, LINESP, POSITION, CHANNEL, and REPEAT are page definition controls related to the lines of text in your printout. Line printer controls examined are the forms control buffer (FCB) and carriage control characters.
As shown in Figure Line-Data File, a file consisting of 13 records is to be printed. Several different printouts of this data are formatted in the following examples. In the first two printouts, records 1–6 are printed on page 1, records 7–9 on page 2, and records 10–13 on page 3.
Line-Data File

Figure Data File Printed on a Line Printer shows the formatting process used when the file is printed on a line printer. For many line printers, an FCB is used to format the output in the S/370 (OS/390 and z/OS, VM, VSE) environment. The sample FCB represented in Figure Data File Printed on a Line Printer determines that no printed page contain more than eight lines. A page can have exactly eight lines without using carriage control characters in the data. A page may contain any number of lines fewer than eight; this is effected by placing fewer than eight records between the carriage control characters in the data. In the data file in data file in the previous figure, fewer than eight records are, in all cases, placed between channel 1 carriage control characters. A ninth record, if encountered before a carriage control character, would cause a page eject and a return