NO HANDLE AND RESP OPTION - IBM Mainframe

The IGNORE CONDITION command suspends CICS exception condition handling for the specified conditions on any command that is subsequently executed. You can temporarily suspend CICS exception condition handling for a particular command by including the NOHANDLE option in the command as shown in the example given:

The NOHANDLE option in this command requests CICS to ignore any exception condition that occurs when the command is executed. If an exception condition occurs, CICS returns control to the application program at the instruction immediately following the READ command. The program can then analyze the command response code in the EIB to determine the results of the command.

Another way of doing this is to code the RESP option in the CICS command. The effect of the RESP option is similar to that of the NOHANDLE option. That is, CICS returns control to the application program at the instruction immediately following the command. The program can determine the results of the command.

However, the RESP option has an added advantage over the NOHANDLE option. When the RESP option is coded in a command, CICS returns a response code to the application program a predefined work storage field. The application program can then examine this response code field, using CICS supplied values, to determine which exception condition has occurred. For example, the response code to the following command will be returned in the working storage field called RECVRSP:

In the preceding command, RECVRSP is a work storage field defined in the program, in which CICS returns the results of the RECEIVE command. The program can examine this field immediately after issuing the command to determine the results of the command. The next example shows how a COBOL program checks, the results of the RECEIVE command.

In the above example, the RECVRSP is the field specified following the RESP option on the preceding RECEIVE command. The program compares the contents of RECVRSP to a list of CICS supplied response code values, referred to as DFHRESP (Condition). These CICS supplied values are automatically included in the application program; no definitions need to be coded by the programmer.

It is more convenient to use the RESP option than the NOHANDLE option because, with RESP, CICS provides the means to examine the response code. With the NOHANDLE option the program must examine the value in the EIBRCODE to determine which exception condition has occurred.

The response field to be defined in the Working storage section should be a full word binary field (PIC S9 (8) COMP).