IBM Mainframe Forum

Hi,

Can anyone help me in writing a heading with underlines. I am trying to write in a PS file. I got a command saying BY ADVANCING 0 LINES. Please put some light on this.

Thanks & Regards,
Sushmita V

Depending upon the printer you are using, it may -- or may not -- be possible to do true underlines. You would have to talk to somebody at your site who knows that printer to know for sure (or find the printer manufacturer and model number, then do your own research). IF the printer supports true underlines, you would set up the underlines as a print line and write it AFTER ADVANCING 0 LINES to overprint the underlines on the same line as the text.

In this case, normal "single spaced" printing would be "advancing 1". What it would do in the past, was click the printer up one sprocket, then print the line. If you use "advancing 0" the sprocket does not not move and the printing is done on the same line of the paper as was already sitting there. If there was printing on that line, the new line "overtypes" it. If the characters on your print-line are "underscores" you have managed to underline the print line.

On your PS, you will see two lines. If they are later correctly sent to the spool, you will see the correct results.

Ok..So even for writing it in to a PS file, we need to use AFTER ADVANCING 1 LINE command... ?

If you are writing to a file, it depends what you want to do with that file. If, later, you want the print output as described by your program when it wrote to the file, you need to keep the correct carriage-control characters in your file. You will see them in the first column of the output. For an underlined line, you will see the original headings, with one control-character, and the underlines as a seperate line with a different control-character. What I'm trying to make clear is that in a file you will see two lines. You won't in any way see a merged-undelined-output-line if you browse a file, or the spool dataset for that matter. To see the underline in action, you have to print (and subject to Robert's points).

Got it. I am having my output file with headings and a line beneath that but not merged as clarified in your post. Need to check out with the printers to get it as merged-underlined-output-lines. Great help! Thanks.