Input data formats

Content Manager OnDemand supports several types of input data formats.

Content Manager OnDemand supports several types of input data:

AFP print data streams (AFP or MO:DCA-P), including line data mixed with AFP structured fields and line data formatted with a page definition.
Line data, also known as IBM® S/390® line data with ANSI or machine carriage control characters.
Unformatted ASCII data that is typically generated in the workstation environment.
Adobe Portable Data Format (PDF) files (Note: An input file cannot exceed 4 GB in size).
Image files in the following formats:
- BMP (Bitmap). A file that contains a bit-mapped graphic.
- GIF (Graphic Interchange Format). A bit-mapped color graphics file format for IBM-compatible computers. GIF uses an efficient compression technique for high resolution graphics.
- JFIF (JPEG Format Image File). A file that contains image data compressed using the JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) standard.
- PCX (Picture Exchange Format). A file that contains a graphic in the PCX file format, widely used by PC applications, such as the PC Paintbrush program. Compressed using PackBytes compression.
- TIFF (Tagged Image File Format). A bit-mapped graphics image format for scanned images with resolutions up to 300 DPI. TIFF simulates gray-scale shading. Content Manager OnDemand supports single and multipage TIFF files that are uncompressed or are compressed using JPEG, CCITT Group 3, CCITT Group 3 / 2D, and CCITT Group 4 compression.

In addition to the types of data listed above, Content Manager OnDemand allows you to store almost any other type of data on the system. For example, you can define an application for HTML documents. When you define the application, you must identify the file type of the data. The file type determines the program that the client starts when the user retrieves a document. For example, if the file type is HTM, then the client could start a web browser to view the document.

In the OS/390® environment, Content Manager OnDemand allows application programs that produce 1403 or 3211 data stream formats to take advantage of overlays, page segments, and typographic fonts. This is done using a page definition that specifies how data is mapped on the page. The definition allows text to be moved to different positions on the page, fonts to be changed, and conditional processing. When combined with a form definition, the page definition allows sophisticated pages to be produced by existing line data applications without changing the application that generates the data.

You can use ACIF to convert line data to AFP data before loading it into the system. The resulting AFP data could add color or an electronic form to line data, making presentation of the information more effective. However, archiving line data without conversion usually results in much higher compression ratios.

AFP supports graphics, presentation text, image, and bar code objects. Storing AFP data on the system allows full-fidelity viewing of presentation text and image objects. For example, users can retrieve and view customer statements that Content Manager OnDemand presents using an electronic form, fonts, and images. The user views a copy of the statement that appears the same as the statement the customer received in the mail. AFP also supports navigation within a report file, using a table of contents.

When you load reports that contain AFP data, you must also load the resources into Content Manager OnDemand. The resources include overlays, page segments, form definitions, and fonts. The resources must be resident on the processor where the data is to be indexed. If data will be indexed on the z/OS system, then the indexing program must gather the resources into a resource group so that the resource group can be transferred to the Content Manager OnDemand server on which you plan to load the data. If data will be indexed on an Content Manager OnDemand server, then the resources must be resident on the Content Manager OnDemand server (or be accessible from the Content Manager OnDemand server) on which you plan to index and load the data.