KERMIT Issue

[Garry Fruth]

At a shop I used to work at, we would distribute software distribution kits to clients (backup savesets) via kermit. I found that zipping the files before kermit would save time. In your case, it would save time and preserve VMS file attributes (using the zip "-V" option).

[Bojan Nemec]

Jack,

I suggest you to try to download the file from another operating system (just for testing purposes) and see if record terminators are present.

Bojan

[Jack Trachtman]

ok, I've tried another VMS system with a different VMS & UCX version and had the same problem.

New info: during the download a status screen is displayed. I happened to be watching the screen when it failed and the Last Error field said something like "error writing file" before that msg was overwritten.

I'm still thinking that its not the download per se that's failing, but its KERMIT's VMS file creation & writing function. Any thoughts?

[David B Sneddon]

Jack,

I am using that same version of Kermit and use
it pretty much every day going between VMS, Linux
and MacOS X with no problems. Can you transfer
files successfully between two VMS systems?
You haven't yet identified what is at the other
end of the transfer that is failing. One of my
first questions was what was at the other end.
Is the system at the other end using a "REAL"
kermit implementation? If not, and you can
successfully transfer between VMS boxes, do you
have anywhere else to test the transfers?
Non-genuine kermit implementations are notorious
for giving Kermit a bad name (just ask Frank).
So, what excatly is at the other end?
Operating system? Kermit implementation?
You say that you get a 0 length file. When
you do a binary transfer it works -- what is the
first byte in the file?

Dave

[Bojan Nemec]

Jack,

When I write another operating system, I mean a different operating system (*NIX,MacOS,Windows etc...).

Abbout the failing VMS file creation and writing. Yes this error is probably due to VMS file record size limitations (the RMS limit for record size in sequential files is 32767). So when you do an ASCII download, Kermit creates a sequential file (probably Variable length, Stream, Stream_LF or Stream_CR, you can see this doing a dir/fu on the 0 byte file). The transffer goes record by record. All languages on VMS use RMS to handle files, also C in which Kermit is writen. If the file has a record longer than the limit, the write fails. The error must be handled by the program and if it is not handled properly you receive a strange error (in yours case "process quota exceeded").
When you do a binary download the process is slightly different. The file is splited in blocks (packets) and this blocks are writen in the file. A binary file on VMS is Fixed length 512 bytes, Record attributes none. So the program writes the file block per block and no error. Record terminators are part of the file and treated as data!
You say that when dumping the binary transfered file there was no record terminators so there are two posiblities:
1) The file on the other site is broken
2) Yours Kermit is broken

I suggest you to make a transfer from a different operating system (other operating systems has no limits on record sizes) and maybe different version of Kermit. Then inspect the file for record terminators (CR/LF pairs or LF - depends on the OS).
If there are no record terminators:
1) The file does not need record terminators (you have not answer my previous question abbout the file contents) which is the case of XML files. You must write a program which will be able to read the binary file and split the file in records so other programs will be able to read it.
2)The problem is on the other site, so you must try to fix the problem with your partner.

If there are record terminators:
1)yours Kermit is broken.
2) yours Kermit is incompatible with the other site.

Bojan

[Jack Trachtman]

OK - at this point I can deal with the file downloaded in binary format. I've spent WAY too much time on this.

I want to thank EVERYBODY who took the time to respond - I'm very impressed.

[Bojan Nemec]

Hi,

If you have problems with reading the binary files please look at my post of Jul 16, 2004 13:32:39 GMT in the http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=637599

There is a simle program for reading binary files in C. If you have not C instaled on yours VMS, please tell us which language you use and I will try to help you.

Bojan

PS
Please take a look to this link
http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/helptips.do?#28

[Jack Trachtman]

Thanks all