TRIGGER

Syntax

TRIGGERn=record,column,value | REGEX='regular expression'[,(TYPE=type)]

Options and values

n

The trigger parameter identifier. When adding a trigger parameter, use the next available number, beginning with 1 (one).

record

The input record where ACIF locates the trigger string value. For TRIGGER1 and float triggers, the input record must be * (asterisk), so that ACIF searches every input record for the trigger string value. For other group triggers, the input record is relative to the record that contains the TRIGGER1 string value. The supported range of record numbers is 0 (the same record that contains the TRIGGER1 string value) to 255.

column

If ACIF is using a value, then this is the beginning column where ACIF locates the trigger string value.

The supported range of column numbers is 0 to 32756. To force ACIF to scan every record from left to right for the trigger string value, specify an * (asterisk) or 0 (zero) for the column. A 1 (one) refers to byte one of the record.

Alternatively, you can specify a beginning and ending column range and separate them by a colon. If you specify a column range, the beginning column cannot be zero, and the ending column must be greater than the beginning column. See the following examples.

Multiplatform systems: If ACIF is using a regular expression, then this is the beginning column where ACIF looks for text that matches the regular expression. The regular expression must match text which begins in the specified column. If a column range is specified, then ACIF will only search the columns in the column range for the text that matches the regular expression. The regular expression must match text which begins in one of the columns specified by the column range. The maximum number of columns to which the regular expression can be applied is 2K (2048 bytes). If there are records in the file which are longer, use a trigger column range to specify a subset of the record.

Important: Scanning every record can incur a substantial performance penalty. The overhead required to scan every record can cause the indexing step of the load process to take considerably longer than normal. Whenever possible, specify a beginning column number.

value

The actual string value that ACIF uses to match the input data. The string value is case sensitive. If the input data is encoded in EBCDIC, enter the value in hexadecimal. The value can be from 1 to 250 bytes in length. You can specify either a value or a regular expression, but not both.

REGEX='regular expression'

The regular expression that ACIF uses to match the input data. The regular expression must be specified in the code page given by the CPGID parameter, and can be from 1 to 250 bytes in length. The regular expression can be specified in hexadecimal. You can specify either a value or a regular expression, but not both.

TYPE=type

The trigger type. The default trigger type is group. TRIGGER1 must be a group trigger. Valid trigger types are:

GROUP

Triggers that identify the beginning of a group. Define only as many group triggers as needed to identify the beginning of a group. In many cases, you might need only one group trigger.

GROUP, RECORDRANGE = (start,end)

Triggers that identify field data that is not always located in the same record relative to TRIGGER1. ACIF determines the location of the field by searching the specified range of records. The range can be from 0 to 255. ACIF stops searching after the first match in the specified range of records. For example, if the range is 5,7 and records six and seven contain the trigger string value, ACIF stops after matching the value in record six.

FLOAT

Triggers that identify field data that does not necessarily occur in the same location on each page, the same page in each group, or in each group. ACIF determines the location of the field by searching every input record for the trigger string value starting in the specified column (or every column, if an asterisk is specified). For example, you need to index statements by type of account. Possible types of accounts include savings, checking, loan, IRA, and so forth. Not all statements contain all types of accounts. This causes the number of pages in a statement to vary and the page number where a specific type of account occurs to vary. However, each type of account is preceded by the string Account Type. Define a float trigger with a trigger string value of Account Type. The same float trigger can be used to locate all of the accounts that occur in a statement.

About group triggers

In ACIF, a group is a named collection of sequential pages that form a logical subset of an input file. A group must contain at least one page; a group can contain all of the pages in an input file. However, most customers define their group triggers so that ACIF can logically divide an input file into smaller parts, such as by statement, policy, bill, or, for transaction data, number of pages. A group is determined when the value of an index changes (for example, account number) or when the maximum number of pages for a group is reached. ACIF generates indexes for each group in the input file. Because a group cannot be smaller than one page, a group trigger should not appear more than once on a page. See the BREAK option of the INDEX parameter for more information about breaking groups.

In Content Manager OnDemand, each indexed group of pages is known as a document. When you index an input file and load the data into the system, Content Manager OnDemand stores the group indexes that are generated by ACIF into the database and stores the documents on storage volumes. Content Manager OnDemand uses the group indexes to determine the documents that match the search criteria that is entered by the user.

Notes

1. ACIF requires that at least one group TRIGGERn value appear within the page range that is specified by the INDEXSTARTBY parameter. If no group TRIGGERn parameter is satisfied within the INDEXSTARTBY page range, then ACIF stops processing and issues an error message.
2. At least one TRIGGERn or FIELDn value must exist on the first page of every unique page group. ACIF cannot detect an error condition if TRIGGERn or FIELDn is missing, but the output might be incorrectly indexed.
3. TRIGGER1 must be specified when ACIF is requested to index the file.
4. An error condition occurs if you specify any TRIGGERn parameters when the input file contains indexing tags.