.-EBCdic----.   
>>-CHAracter--+-----------+------------------------------------><
              +-*---------+   
              +-ASCii-----+   
              +-CHAracter-+   
              +-HEX-------+   
              +-PACked----+   
              '-ZONed-----'   

EBCDIC

Character variables are EBCDIC, with unprintable characters (X'00' to X'3F', X'FF') displayed as . (periods).

*

Character variables are displayed in the default format (EBCDIC).

ASCII

Character variables are ASCII, with unprintable characters displayed as . (periods).

CHARACTER

Character variables are displayed as EBCDIC or ASCII, tracking the value of the ASCII setting selected for the DUMP command. Unprintable characters are displayed as . (periods).

HEX

Character variables are displayed in hexadecimal. This mode is especially useful for buffers which are declared as CHAR and which contain non-character information.

PACKED

Character variables of less than 24 bytes are displayed in Packed Decimal format. Variables exceeding this length are displayed in hexadecimal. This mode is especially useful for examining data in a language without native Packed Decimal variables.

ZONED

Character variables of less than 48 bytes are displayed in Zoned Decimal format. Variables exceeding this length are displayed in EBCDIC. This mode is especially useful for examining data in a language without native Zoned Decimal variables.

If the display format setting is not specified, the current display format for character variables is shown in a message.

Return codes

0

Operation successful

2

Keyword truncated

5

Not valid character variable display format