Creating a Character Arrangement Table Module

The 3800 character arrangement table module is fixed length and consists of three sections:

System control information, which contains the module's name and length.
The translation table, which contains 256 one-byte translation table entries, corresponding to the 8-bit data codes (X'00' through X'FF'). A translation table entry can identify one of 64 character positions in any one of four writable character generation modules (WCGMs) except the last position in the fourth WCGM (WCGM 3), which would be addressed by X'FF'. The code X'FF' is reserved to indicate an unprintable character. When an entry of X'FF' is detected by the printer as a result of attempting to translate an unusable 8-bit data code, the printer prints a blank and sets the data-check indicator on (unless the block-data-check option is in effect).
Identifiers, which identify the character sets and the graphic character modification modules associated with the character arrangement table.

For the 3800 Model 1 or Model 3, if the character set identifier is even, the character set is accessed from the printer's flexible disk. If the identifier is odd, the character set is retrieved from the image library.

The character arrangement table is created using the INCLUDE, TABLE, and NAME utility control statements. The INCLUDE statement identifies an existing character arrangement table that is to be copied and used as a basis for the new module. The TABLE statement describes the contents of the new or modified module. The NAME statement identifies the character arrangement table and indicates whether it is new or is to replace an existing module with the same name.

The OPTION statement with the DEVICE=3800M3 parameter should be specified when printing an existing character arrangement table for a 3800 Model 3. This is to ensure that the system assigns the correct prefix to the graphic modification module name associated with the character arrangement table.

Note: The character arrangement table you select mightnot include all the characters in a character set. The character arrangement table corresponds to a print train, which is sometimes a subset of one or more complete character sets. When the character set is loaded, all characters of the set (up to 64) are loaded into the printer's WCGM; only those characters that are referred to by a translation table can be printed.

Related reading: For information about IBM-supplied character arrangement tables and character sets, see IBM 3800 Printing Subsystem Programmer's Guide.