Program description

The SuperC program is a fast and versatile program that can process:

Two sequential data sets
Two complete partitioned data sets
Members of two partitioned data sets
Concatenated data sets.

In fact, any data set that can be processed by ISPF can be processed by the SuperC program.

Note: SuperC does not support tape data sets.

SuperC can compare data sets even when there are many differences and redundant data. Some examples of redundant data are blank lines, duplicate words, and binary data with many duplicate characters.

Unlike many compare programs, SuperC is not limited to comparing data sets on a line-by-line basis. Instead, it allows you to choose between the four comparison levels listed. The compare type you select determines which kinds of data differences are presented by SuperC. See Reasons for differing comparison results for more information about comparison results.

File comparisons produce summary information about the differences between the data sets being compared.
Line comparisons are record-oriented and show matching, inserted, deleted, and reformatted lines. This level is most useful for comparing lines of program source code. It provides the least output difference information and is least sensitive to resynchronization.
Word comparisons show differences between data strings that are delimited by blanks or nonalphanumeric characters, such as commas. Matching words are found, even if they are not on the same line. This level is most useful for comparing text data sets.
Byte comparisons determine byte differences. It is most useful for comparing unformatted and machine-readable data.

The SuperC program requires only the names of the input data sets. However, the utility you are using may require other information, such as a listing type. Also, you can enter these types of processing information and options on the utility data entry panels:

Compare type
Listing data set name or destination
Process options
Statements or profile data set name
Browse output choice.

The SuperC program allows you to create two kinds of output:

A listing that shows the results of the comparison or search and
A structured data set that contains update information.

Within these two categories, you can create many kinds of output that make it easy to see where your data differs. To see your comparison results, you can generate listings that show:

An overall summary of total changes
The actual source code where deltas (differences) were found
The deltas plus up to 10 (the default) matching lines before and after
The deltas plus all matching lines.

You can format the listings to show differences either sequentially or side-by-side.

In an update data set, output lines are identified and results are put in specific columns. An update data set is especially useful as input to a user-written application program. It allows a program to customize what you see, changing generalized output to information that is specific to a particular application.

The SuperC utility (options 3.12, 3.13, and 3.14) CLISTs allocate or free space under these DDNAMEs: SYSIN, SYSIN2, OLDDD, NEWDD, OUTDD, and DELDD.