Using This Reference › Characters Used In z/OS Commands

Characters Used In z/OS Commands

Following is a list of the valid characters that can be used in z/OS commands:

Character Set: Alphanumeric

Contents:

• Alphabetic, Uppercase A through Z
• Numeric, 0 through 9

Character Set: National (see Note)

Contents:

• At sign @
• Dollar sign $
• Pound sign #

These characters can be represented by hexadecimal values X'7C', X'5B', and X'7B'.

Character Set: Special

• Comma ,
• Period .
• Slash /
• Apostrophe '
• Left parenthesis (
• Right parenthesis )
• Asterisk *
• Ampersand &
• Plus sign +
• Hyphen -
• Equal sign =
• Cent sign ¢
• Less than sign <
• Vertical bar |
• Exclamation point !
• Semicolon ;
• Percent sign %
• Underscore _
• Greater than sign >
• Question mark ?
• Colon :
• Quotation marks “

Guidelines:

• Do not use a prefix that is an abbreviation for an already defined process. For example, a prefix such as D conflicts with z/OS commands such as DISPLAY.
• Do not define a prefix that is either a subset or a superset of an existing prefix with the same first character. For example, if command prefix $ABC already exists, command prefixes $, $A, and $AB are subsets of, and conflict with, the original prefix. Similarly, prefixes $ABC1 and $ABC$ also conflict with existing prefix $ABC because they are supersets with the same first character. You can, however, define command prefixes ABC, BC, or C, because they do not start with the same first character as the existing prefix. You can see which prefixes exist by issuing the DISPLAY OPDATA z/OS command or by using the OPSCFP OPS/REXX function.

Note: The system recognizes the following hexadecimal representations of the U.S. National characters: @ as X'7C', $ as X'5B', and # as X'7B'. In countries other than the U.S., the U.S. National characters represented on terminal keyboards might generate a different hexadecimal representation and cause an error. For example, in some countries, the $character may generate X'4A'.