Object naming conventions for IBM MQ Managed File Transfer

Use the following naming conventions for your IBM® MQ Managed File Transfer objects:

  • Agent names can be a maximum of 28 characters long and are not case-sensitive. Agent names entered in lowercase or mixed case are converted to uppercase. Agent names must conform to standard WebSphere® MQ object naming conventions. These conventions are detailed as follows: Rules for naming WebSphere MQ objects.
  • In addition to the WebSphere MQ object naming conventions, the forward slash (/) character cannot be used in agent names.
  • In addition to the WebSphere MQ object naming conventions, the percent (%) character cannot be used in agent names.
  • The names of properties in the properties files are case-sensitive.
  • Queue manager names are case-sensitive.
  • File names are case-sensitive for some platforms.
  • Resource monitor names are not case-sensitive. Resource monitor names entered in lowercase or mixed case are converted to uppercase. Resource monitor names must not contain asterisk (*), percent (%) or question mark (?) characters.
  • Protocol file server names must be a minimum of 2 characters long but there is no maximum length limit, they are not case-sensitive. Protocol server names must conform to standard WebSphere MQ object naming conventions. These conventions are detailed as follows: Rules for naming WebSphere MQ objects.

Web Gateway names

  • Web Gateway names can be a maximum of 28 characters long and are not case-sensitive. Web Gateway names entered in lowercase or mixed case are converted to uppercase. Web Gateway names must conform to standard WebSphere MQ object naming conventions. These conventions are detailed in: Rules for naming WebSphere MQ objects. In addition to the WebSphere MQ object naming conventions, the forward slash (/) character and percent (%) character cannot be used in Web Gateway names.
  • If you deploy multiple instances of the same Web Gateway, use the same name for each instance.
  • If you deploy more than one separate Web Gateway, use different names for each gateway. Do not create more than one Web Gateway with the same name.
  • Give a web agent that is a component of a Web Gateway a similar name to the name of the Web Gateway. For example, if the Web Gateway is named WG1_GTWY, name the web agent WG1_AGNT_QM1.

Files in the IBM i integrated file system (IFS)

File names in the IFS cannot contain any of the following characters:
  • Backslash (\)
  • Forward slash (/)
  • Colon (:)
  • Asterisk (*)
  • Question mark (?)
  • Quotation marks (")
  • Less than symbol (<)
  • Greater than symbol (>)
  • Vertical bar (|)
If you attempt to transfer files with names containing any of these characters to an IBM i IFS, the transfer of these files fails.

Data set names

Data sets have naming restrictions, which affect the maximum name length and the available characters that you can use for data set names. PDS data set member names can be a maximum of eight characters and cannot contain the dot (.) character. When you transfer to a data set, you must explicitly specify the name, which means these naming restrictions do not cause a problem. But when you transfer from files to PDS members the file path might not map to a PDS member name. When you transfer to a PDS data set, each source file becomes a PDS member and each member name is generated from the name of the source.
PDS member names are z/OS® unqualified names and are defined by the following regular expression: 

 [a-zA-Z$#@][a-zA-Z0-9$#@]{0-7}
The following scheme is used to convert a source data set or source file name to a valid PDS member name. The considerations are applied in the order listed:
  1. Only the characters in the name after the last forward slash (/), the last backslash (\), or the last colon (:) character, are used. That is, only the name part of a file path is used.
  2. For source files (not data sets or PDS members), the characters after and including the last dot (.) character, are ignored.
  3. For any name longer than eight characters, the last eight characters only are used.
  4. Dot characters are replaced with at sign (@) characters.
  5. Invalid characters are replaced with at sign (@) characters.
  6. If the conversion produces no characters, the PDS member name is @.