Padding and truncation

You can control the action that DFSORT takes when the SORTOUT LRECL is smaller than the SORTIN/SORTINnn LRECL with the TRUNC option as described in OPTION control statement.

DFSORT truncates fixed-length records on the right when the SORTOUT LRECL is smaller than the SORTIN/SORTINnn LRECL provided that:

The application is not a conventional merge or tape work data set sort.
TRUNC=RC16 is not in effect.

You can control the action that DFSORT takes when a variable-length output record is longer than the LRECL of the SORTOUT or OUTFIL data set to which it is to be written by using the VLLONG or NOVLLONG option as described in OPTION control statement.

You can control the action that DFSORT takes when the SORTOUT LRECL is larger than the SORTIN/SORTINnn LRECL with the PAD option as described in OPTION control statement.

DFSORT pads fixed-length records with binary zeros on the right when the SORTOUT LRECL is larger than the SORTIN LRECL provided that:

The Blockset technique is selected.
The application is a sort or copy.
PAD=RC16 is not in effect.

DFSORT does not pad or truncate records returned from an E15 or E35 user exit since it expects the exit to pad or truncate each record appropriately.

You can use INREC, OUTREC, and OUTFIL to pad, truncate, and reformat records. See INREC control statement and OUTREC control statement for details.

See Use ICEGENER instead of IEBGENER for information about padding and truncating with ICEGENER.

For more information about Blockset and other DFSORT techniques, see Specify efficient sort/merge techniques.