This topic describes the z/OS Unicode environment, its key concepts, what it contains, how to work with it, and related issues.

The z/OS Unicode environment holds data required to perform conversions and support the other services provided by z/OS Unicode Services. As an example, it might hold the information required to transform character data from CCSID 00037 to CCSID 01200. This conversion data normally consists of one or more conversion tables, in this case EBCDIC to Unicode, along with their related control blocks.

Various services locate conversion data within the z/OS Unicode environment. For example, if the character conversion service is asked to translate character data from CCSID 00037 to 01200, it locates the appropriate conversion table within the Unicode environment.

Later sections in this topic describe more about how conversions are added and deleted from the Unicode environment.