OW54280: ABEND878 RUNNING A LISTUSER WITH AN ASTERISK (*) INSTEAD OF A USERID OR LIST OF USERIDS

APAR status

• Closed as Permanent restriction.

Error description

• In a batch job using IKJEFT01 customer issues:
  LISTUSER * TSO DFP
  .
  On an OS/390 V2R6  system the job goes eoj.
  .
  On an OS/390 V2R10 system the job incurs an abend878 and
  doesn't complete successfully.
  .
  The abend878 is a function of the number of userids and
  may or may not occur depending upon other operands
  (NORACF, or specifying non base segment operands - DFP
  OMVS, TSO, etc).
  .
  Storage obtained by IRRDPR22 for the output blocks.
  .
  

Local fix

• A)  Instead of doing the one large LU command in one step
       do this:
    1) in step1 of a two step batch job issue a search command
       and utilizing the CLIST operand:
       SR CLASS(USER) NOMASK NOLIST CLIST(' LU ' ' TSO DFP')
       <the above command directly replaces what the above
          customer need to use - can be tailored as necessary >
    2) step2 executes the generated clist dataset
       userid.RACF.EXEC.CLIST
  .
  B) If the info being sought is ONLY the non-base segment
     information try using NORACF operand.
  .
  C) The recommended method for gathering lists of userids and
     all the requisite information is to use the DataBase Unload
     utility - IRRDBU00, which creates a flatfile that can be
     read for all the pertinent data
  .
  

Problem summary

• ****************************************************************
  * USERS AFFECTED: RACF commands having many thousands of       *
  *                 lines of output                              *
  ****************************************************************
  * RECOMMENDATION:                                              *
  ****************************************************************
  Some RACF commands generate a very large output of many
  thousands of lines such as LU * or LG *.  This consumes
  many address space resources.  In this case, storage below
  the 16M line was exhausted causing abend 878.
  

Problem conclusion

• The large amount of output produced by these commands makes
  them more likely to be examined by a program than to be read
  by a user.
  
  RACF does not support the command output as a programming
  interface and will document this in the z/OS Security
  Server RACF Command Language Refernce SA22-7687-03. The
  text will be inserted in "Chapter 3. RACF TSO Commands"
  after the first paragraph.
  
    Please note that the RACF commands that provide output
    listings (LISTDSD, LISTUSER, LISTGROUP, RLIST)  are
    designed to be issued by users, not by programs, and that
    IBM does not support the processing of the command output
    by programs.  The format of the command output is not an
    intended interface, and output may change format with any
    z/OS release or as the result of service (PTFs) within a
    release, making it difficult to use in programs.  Programs
    should not examine this output, but should instead use
    documented programming interfaces, such as: the output file
    from IRRDBU00 (database unload), the results returned by
    RACROUTE REQUEST=EXTRACT, or the results returned by
    ICHEINTY.
  
    Note that some RACF commands generate a very large output
    of many thousands of lines such as LU * or LG *.  This
    quantity of output is not very usable except as input to a
    processing program and can exhaust address space resources
    such as storage below the 16M line.  The command output
    was not intended for this kind of use.  The database
    unload utility IRRDBU00 was designed specifically for this
    use.
  
  For LISTGRP at the end of the group-name | * operand
  discussion, as a note, add:
  
    Use of * may result in a large amount of output, especially
    on a system with many groups defined, and thus may not be
    useful to a user issuing the command.  It may be more
    appropriate for the user to browse the output of IRRDBU00
    (database unload) or to write a program to process the
    IRRDBU00 output and produce a report showing only the
    subset of information that is of interest to the user.  In
    particular, please note that processing the output of LG by
    programs is not supported nor recommended by IBM; if you
    want a listing of all the groups for use by a program you
    should instead have the program process the output from
    IRRDBU00, RACROUTE REQUEST=EXTRACT, or ICHEINTY.
  
  For LISTUSER at the end of the userid | * operand discussion,
  as a second note, add:
  
    Use of * may result in a large amount of output, especially
    on a system with many users defined, and thus may not be
    useful to a user issuing the command.  It may be more
    appropriate for the user to browse the output of IRRDBU00
    (database unload) or to write a program to process the
    IRRDBU00 output and produce a report showing only the
    subset of information that is of interest to the user.  In
    particular, please note that processing the output of LU by
    programs is not supported nor recommended by IBM; if you
    want a listing of all the users for use by a program you
    should instead have the program process the output from
    IRRDBU00, RACROUTE REQUEST=EXTRACT, or ICHEINTY.
  
  For RLIST at the end of the profile-name | * operand
  discussion, as a note, add:
  
    Use of * may result in a large amount of output, especially
    on a system with many profiles defined, and thus may not be
    useful to a user issuing the command.  It may be more
    appropriate for the user to browse the output of IRRDBU00
    (database unload) or to write a program to process the
    IRRDBU00 output and produce a report showing only the
    subset of information that is of interest to the user.  In
    particular, please note that processing the output of RL by
    programs is not supported nor recommended by IBM; if you
    want a listing of all the users for use by a program you
    should instead have the program process the output from
    IRRDBU00, RACROUTE REQUEST=EXTRACT, or ICHEINTY.
  

Temporary fix

Comments

APAR Information

• APAR is sysrouted FROM one or more of the following:

• APAR is sysrouted TO one or more of the following:

Modules/Macros

• NA
  

Fix information

Applicable component levels