Shell commands and utilities

Both the z/OS shell and the tcsh shell provide commands and utilities that give the user an efficient way to request a range of services. In this topic, the term command is used to include both a command (a directive to a shell to perform a specific task) and a utility (the name of a program callable by name from a shell).

Shell commands often have options (also known as flags) that you can specify, and they usually take an argument—such as the name of a file or directory. The format for specifying the command begins with the command name, then the option or options, and finally the argument, if any. For example:

ls -a myfiles

ls is the command name, -a is the option, and myfiles is the argument.

This information describes various commands you can use to perform certain tasks; most of these are shell commands, and some are TSO/E commands. This discussion highlights only certain functions of the command. For complete information about each command and all its options, see z/OS UNIX System Services Command Reference