Defining application panels: the PANEL tag

You use the panel tag, its associated attributes, and the required panel end tag to define an application panel and the specific characteristics of the panel.

The PANEL start and end tags define the beginning and ending of an application panel. The PANEL start tag defines:

Panel name
Name of the help panel for the application panel
Name of the panel default
Dimensions of the panel
Associated key mapping list
KEYLTYPE value
APPLID value
Cursor placement
CCSID number
MENU keyword
PRIME keyword
TUTOR keyword
WINDOW value
WINTITLE value
APPTITLE value
PAD value
PADC value
OUTLINE value
EXPAND value.
MSGLINE value
TITLINE value
CMDLINE value
ATTRUSE value
ENDATTR value
TYPE value
SMSG value
LMSG value
ASIS keyword
ACTBAR keyword
MERGESAREA value
PANELSTMT value
ENTKEYTEXT value
IMAPNAME value
IMAPROW value
IMAPCOL value
TMARGIN value
BMARGIN value
ERRORCHECK value
ZUP value
ZCONT value
AUTONRET value
AUTOTCMD value
Panel title text

With the exception of the required NAME attribute used to identify the name of the application panel, all of the attributes for the PANEL tag are optional. Many attributes have default values that the conversion utility assumes if you do not specify the attribute. This topic describes these attributes, and how to use them.

The PANEL start and end tags look like this, respectively:

<panel name=mainpan>
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</panel>

In the preceding example, we included the required NAME attribute and its value mainpan on the PANEL start tag. ISPF requires that each panel definition contain this attribute and an associated value to identify the panel. The panel name is also used as the panel ID when the panel ID is displayed. The “NAME=*” notation sets the panel name to be the same as the member name of the input DTL source file. If multiple panel definitions have been combined within a single source file, then this notation should be used for only one panel definition within the file.

The panel name must follow the naming convention described in Rules for variable names.

Note: During conversion when the PREP option is active, the conversion utility uses a temporary PDS to store ISPF source format panels.

The file name for interactive use is: tsoprefix.TEMPDTLW.DTLPANnn, or, if the TSO NOPREFIX profile option is in effect, the file name is: tsouserid.TEMPDTLW.DTLPANnn. nn is the screen number.

For batch, the file name is: tsoprefix.TEMPDTLW.DTLBATCH.Ttttttt.Rnnnnn, or, if the TSO NOPREFIX profile option is in effect, the file name is: tsouserid.TEMPDTLW.DTLBATCH.Ttttttt.Rnnnnn.

The batch file name is uniquely created for each ISPDTLC invocation by including the system time and a random number as the last two qualifiers of the name.

The ISPPREP utility is called to convert all of the generated panels from ISPF source format to preprocessed format at one time to improve performance.