Translating messages

The MVS™ message service (MMS) provides a method of translating message text, and provides a convenient method of storing message text.

MMS enables you to translate U.S. English messages into other languages. These messages can be IBM-supplied messages or application messages. An application can format message text for any language, including English, by issuing the TRANMSG macro.
MMS enables you to store message text in MMS message files rather than in the application code. By using MMS to store message text, you eliminate the need to include the message text as part of the application code. Any program that needs to issue a particular message can get it from one place: a run-time message file. A run-time message file contains messages in a format that MMS can use. You can also update your messages in the install message files rather than in the source code. An install message file is a partitioned data set (PDS) that contains message skeletons. A message skeleton contains message text and substitution data.

Applications running on TSO/E can have their messages translated automatically if the primary language associated with the TSO/E session is the same language as the language of the run-time message file. A primary language is one that is defined in your TSO/E profile. Therefore, even if you are issuing messages by using the WTO macro, you can present a message in the primary language associated with the TSO/E session. If you are routing system messages to a TSO/E extended MCS console, and MMS is active, users of extended MCS consoles on TSO/E can select available languages for message translation and the system will display translated messages on the user's screen.

Applications based on products not already using MMS must translate their own messages by invoking the TRANMSG macro.

MMS can handle multi-line and multiple format messages. Multi-line messages are messages displayed over a number of lines on an output device. Multiple format messages are messages that have the same message ID, but have differing text content depending on the circumstances under which they are issued.

Preparing IBM-supplied messages for translation: To prepare IBM® messages for translation, perform the following tasks:

Ensure that the appropriate IBM-supplied system install message files have been installed on your system.
For MVS messages (MVS, JES2, TSO/E), IBM provides an install message file for U.S. English messages. IBM will also supply Japanese versions of those messages, if requested. When you install MVS, these messages are automatically put into install message files. The U.S. English file is called SYS1.MSGENU.
Create a system run-time message file for each language by running the system's install message files through the message compiler. See Compiling message files for details on using the compiler.

Preparing application messages for translation: To prepare an application's messages for translation, perform the following tasks.

Create a PDS for the English version, and a PDS for the translated version of the application's messages. To make it easy to locate and update messages, group messages for each program, component, or other category into separate PDS members. These data sets are the application's install message files. The logical record length of the data set should be variable length of 259, and the block size 23476. IBM recommends that you put IBM messages first in a PDS concatenation. If you are not translating IBM messages, you can still use the same recommended logical record length and block size.
Validate the application's install message files by running each PDS through the message compiler. See Compiling message files for details on using the compiler. The MMS message compiler replaces the entire run-time message file, so create a test run-time message file for each language, using names different from those containing IBM-supplied messages. Creating a test run-time message file enables you to verify the new messages without disturbing the existing system run-time message files and current message translation.
After a clean compile, add your PDS members into the system's install message files as new members.
Update the system run-time message files by running the system's install message files through the message compiler. See Updating the system run-time message files for details on updating the system run-time message files.

Figure 1 illustrates the process of preparing messages for translation.

Figure 1. Preparing Messages for Translation

Translating application messages using the MVS message service: To use MMS in an application, modify the application to exploit the translation service that MMS provides:

Use the QRYLANG macro to determine which languages are currently available at your installation. For more information on QRYLANG, see Determining which languages are available (QRYLANG macro).
Use the TRANMSG macro to obtain from MMS the translated version or the complete U.S. English message text of an application's message or messages. For more information on TRANMSG, see Retrieving translated messages (TRANMSG macro).

The installation can translate messages into more than one language. See Support for additional languages.