This document contains answers to many common questions on the OpenVMS operating system, and covers OpenVMS, and OpenVMS running on Itanium, Alpha, and VAX hardware.

While this document is available in multiple formats, the text-format version is far and away generally the easiest format to search.

Revision/Update Information OpenVMS V8.3

Revision/Update Information: Revision Date/July 2006

Contents

Index

This is the OpenVMS Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) posting for the news://comp.os.vms/ and news:comp.sys.dec usenet newsgroups.

If you believe any particular discussion worthy of inclusion in a future edition of the FAQ and particularly once you have or know both the question and the answer, please then send the entire discussion along to the FAQ Editor for potential inclusion.

Do note that the FAQ Editor takes URL link continuity seriously, and strives to maintain current links. This is, however, a large task, and it is only becoming more difficult. URL link continuity is also something that you can assist with, of course. If you should find a dead link or a stale URL pointer, please notify the FAQ Editor . If you have or can find the current, correct or updated URL, of course, that greatly assists the FAQ Editor in maintaining the most current set of links.

Thank you!

Contributors

Many people have contributed to this FAQ, directly and/or indirectly. In many cases, part or all of an answer included in the FAQ has been adapted from one or more postings from the news://comp.os.vms/ or other newsgroup---this though individual citations and specific quotations are generally not included in this FAQ. (The FAQ Editor wishes to thank to all of those folks who post answers to the newsgroups, and that have contributed to the contents of and to the general improvements of this FAQ.)

The following is an incomplete list of the folks that have contributed directly or indirectly to the contents of the OpenVMS FAQ. Additions, corrections, and updates to this list of contributors and to the contents of the FAQ itself are welcome, and all omissions and misspellings are unintentional. Thanks to each of the contributors here, and to all of the folks that have participated in the FAQ and in the newsgroups.

Jim Agnew, Paul Anderson, Jason Armistead, Zoltan Arpadffy, John AtoZ, Bailey, Gary Barclay, (The) Beav, Jeremy Begg, Colin Blake, Fabrice Blanquart, Ken Blaylock, Kenneth Block, Bol, Craig Berry, Mark Berryman, Jim Becker, Verell Boaen, Bol, Jim Brankin, Richard Brodie, Colin Butcher, Robert Alan Byer, Jeff Campbell, Scott Campbell, Antonio Carlini, Keith Cayemberg, Ken Chaney, Cristy, John Croll, David J. Dachtera, Robert Deininger, Dale Dellutri, Leo Demers, Sue Denham, Thomas Dickey, Eric Dittman, Mike Duffy, Jim Dunham, Eric, Glenn Everhart, Ken Fairfield, Yaacov Fenster, Gunther Froehlin, Harry Garonzik, Derek Garson, John Gillings, Andy Goldstein, Clair Grant, Hunter Goatley, Ruth Goldenberg, Vance Haemmerle, Ki Suk Hahn, SHarris, Rich Hearn, Fletcher Hearns, Phillip Helbig, Hein van den Heuvel, Stephen Hoffman, Eberhard Heuser-Hofmann, Sue Holt, Mark Hopkins, Horn, Jaf, Leif Jansson, Kevin Jenkins, Don R. Jones, Henry Juengst, inazu_k, Geoff Kingsmill, Fred Kleinsorge, Felix Kreisel, Veli Korkko, Ruslan R. Laishev, Peter "EPLAN" Langstoeger, Norm Lastovica, p_lee, Jerry Leichter, Richard Levitte, Tom Linden, Steve Lionel, Denis Maillard, Kerry Main, John E. Malmberg, David Mathog, Dale Miller, Ian Miller, Dick Munroe, Patrick Moreau, Morrison, otis, George Pagliarulo, Keith Parris, Plass, pvhp, David Rabahy, Stan Rabinowitz, Mike Raspuzzi, Steve Reece, Neil Rieck, Ian Ring, Aaron Sakovich, Warren Sander, Mark Schafer, Brian Schenkenberger, Atlant Schmidt, Wayne Sewell, Steven Shamlian, Sue Skonetski, Scott Snadow, Sue Sommer, Scott Squires, stfp, Dave Sweeney, Mike Thompson, Arne Vajhøj, Martin Vorländer, Peter Weaver, William Webb, Williams, Paul Winalski, Uwe Zinser.

Again, any omission from this list and any errors or misspellings are entirely unintentional. Please notify the FAQ Editor of any omissions, corrections, or updates that might be needed within this list. And thanks to each of these individuals for their assistance and for their contributions, and particularly for sharing their expertise.

FAQ Archives and FAQ Locations

The OpenVMS FAQ is archived in (at least) the following locations:

• http://www.hp.com/go/openvms/faq/
• ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/comp.os.vms/
• news:comp.answers
• news:news.answers
• http://www.faqs.org/
• http://www.google.com/
• http://eisner.decus.org/vms/faq.htm
• http://www.hoffmanlabs.org/

Other internet FAQs are generally available in these locations:

• news://comp.answers
• news://news.answers
• ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/
• http://www.faqs.org/
• http://www.google.com/

FAQ File Formats and Production Information

This FAQ is available in ASCII text, Postscript, Bookreader, and HTML, and potentially in other file formats. Certain formats, such as the Adobe Acrobat PDF conversion from the Postscript format, are provided downstream from the FAQ text formatting, and are provided and maintained by others.

As the HTML-format FAQ is not a single monolithic (and accordingly large) HTML file, it is the most difficult format to search using the most common standard (platform-local) tools. Accordingly, the FAQ Editor recommends downloading, using and searching the ASCII text FAQ format.

The OpenVMS FAQ is maintained in DECdocument SDML format and all FAQ maintenance and the primary output file format conversions are performed on OpenVMS systems. For information on the DECdocument product, please contact Touch Technologies.

Old FAQ Section Notations Available in Index

For the folks that are familiar with older editions of this FAQ and specifically for those folks looking for the older section name keywords, please see the index entries located under FAQ Sections (Old). These older section names include the prefixes DCL, DECW, DOC, FILES, MISC, MGMT, INTRO, SOFT, VMS, etc., followed by the section number.

The Fine Print

Corrections and suggestions are welcome. Should you believe you can provide better stewardship of this FAQ, or should you have strong feelings over the content, structure, organization or implementation of the FAQ, do realize you may be offered the editorship. The editor maintains this document as a free service to the OpenVMS community.

While the information contained here is believed correct, the use of any and all information acquired from this document is entirely at the risk of the user(s). If your system should crash or your data should become corrupted or the answer(s) found here should be found erroneous, that is solely your risk and your responsibility.

Though the editor of this FAQ is an employee of Hewlett-Packard Company (HP), this posting and the information contained within this FAQ are is not an official statement of HP, nor a commitment by HP. All information, comments or opinions included, cited or otherwise referenced here may or may not reflect the stated opinions of HP, of the editor, or of any other entity.

All trademarks, registered trademarks, servicemarks and registered servicemarks used or referenced here are the properties of their respective owner(s) or holders. Please route any corrections, requests or related updates to the FAQ Editor

The redistribution, reposting and/or the web-serving of complete and unaltered copies of this FAQ document is permitted. Other uses only with prior permission.

The master copy of this FAQ is posted at

• http://www.hp.com/go/openvms/faq

Translations of this FAQ into various languages may be available, please contact the maintainer(s) of any translated document for assistance or feedback involving the particular translated edition of this FAQ.

If you are searching for something here, please consider using the text-format FAQ.

If you have no other OpenVMS URLs bookmarked, you will want to be familiar with the URLs listed in Table 1-1:

Table 1-1 Core Websites

URL	Contents
Core OpenVMS Information, including roadmaps and release schedules
	http://www.hp.com/go/openvms/
OpenVMS and Core Layered Product Documentation
	http://www.hp.com/go/openvms/doc/
Core OpenVMS Support Search Engine URLs, the ITRC support and discussion forums, and the ITRC FTP-accessable Patch Area
	http://www2.itrc.hp.com/service/james/CPQhome.do (formerly the NLSA Natural Language Search Assistant, and formerly AskQ.)
	http://www.itrc.hp.com/
	ftp://ftp.itrc.hp.com/openvms_patches/
The OpenVMS Freeware
	http://www.hp.com/go/openvms/freeware/
The OpenVMS Hobbyist License Program
	http://www.openvmshobbyist.org/
	http://h71000.www7.hp.com/openvms/license_software_programs/index.html

1.2 What are the OpenVMS Usenet Newsgroups?

There are a huge number of newsgroups available, some of which discuss topics of interest to folks using OpenVMS operating system. Key among these are the news://comp.os.vms/ newsgroup and the vmsnet.* heirarchy of newsgroups.

1.2.1 What is the scope of the comp.os.vms newsgroup?

The news://comp.os.vms/ newsgroup is the primary newsgroup for discussion of the HP OpenVMS operating system and the computer systems on which it runs. Questions about layered products which run on OpenVMS are also welcome, though many of them (in particular, language compilers and database systems) have more specific newsgroups. If a question has some relationship to OpenVMS, it belongs in news://comp.os.vms/

1.2.2 What newsgroups carry VMS-related information?

The vmsnet.* hierarchy is operated by the Encompass users group (formerly known as DECUS), and contains various newsgroups of interest, including vmsnet.misc and vmsnet.alpha.

Sprechen Sie Deutsch? Besuchen Sie bitte den newsgroup de.comp.os.vms.

The comp.sys.dec newsgroup carries general discussions about various HP computer systems, and specifically systems that were acquired by HP as part of the acquisition of Compaq, systems which had previously been acquired by Compaq as part of the acquisition of Digital Equipment Corporation (DIGITAL).

Also of interest are resources and conferencing systems including Encompasserve (formerly known as DECUServe) and Ken Farmer's OpenVMS.Org forums:

• telnet://eisner.decus.org/
• http://www.openvms.org/

Extensive archives of INFO-VAX mailings and news://comp.os.vms/ postings are archived and available at SRI International: http://mvb.saic.com/freeware/info-vax/

Google also has extensive newsgroup archives available at

• http://www.google.com/

INFO-VAX is a mailing list which is bidirectionally gatewayed to the news://comp.os.vms/ newsgroup. This means that postings to news://comp.os.vms/ get automatically sent to INFO-VAX subscribers and messages sent to the INFO-VAX list are automatically posted to news://comp.os.vms/

INFO-VAX can be a useful way to participate in the newsgroup if you can't access the newsgroup directly through a newsreader. Note that INFO-VAX is a closed mailing list, which means that only subscribers may post to it. Please see Section 1.2.4.1 for information on how to subscribe, and how you can subscribe such that you can post from multiple addresses but still receive no more than one copy of the mailings.

Please remember that propogation delays can and do vary, meaning that mailings and postings may be delayed or even lost. It is quite possible that postings may not be delivered for several days, and that some postings will appear out of the expected order.

For details on the available archives, please see Section 1.2.3.

1.2.4.1 How do I subscribe to or unsubscribe from INFO-VAX?

The address for subscription requests is Info-VAX-Request[at]Mvb.Saic.Com. Subscription requests are handled automatically by a mail server. This mail server ignores the subject line and processes each line of the message as a command.

The syntax for subscribing and unsubscribing, as well as setting various parameters on your subscription, is:

Table 1-2 INFO-VAX Mail Server Commands

Command	Description
HELP	Acquire information on mail server
SUBSCRIBE INFO-VAX	Join to the mailing list
UNSUBSCRIBE INFO-VAX	Leave the mailing list
SET INFO-VAX DIGEST	Select periodic omnibus mail messages from the mail server, rather than multiple individual messages for each posting.
SET INFO-VAX NODIGEST	Separate mail delivery of each message posted
SET INFO-VAX NOMAIL	Establish an email address for posting, though not for receiving, mail.
SET INFO-VAX MAIL	Establish an email address for both posting and for receiving mail from the mailing list.

The mail server is not case-sensitive; case is irrelevant. Settings and policies can be retrieved from the mail server, typically using HELP.

The INFO-VAX moderator can be contacted directly at the email address Mark.Berryman[at]Mvb.Saic.Com.

1.3 What is [n]etiquette?

Before posting or emailing a question, please use the available local resources, such as the OpenVMS manuals, the HELP, and the resources and information in and referenced by this FAQ. Please use these first. Also please specifically read the release notes and (if appropriate) the cover letter for the product you are using. (The release notes are generally placed in SYS$HELP:.) Quite often, these simple steps will allow you to quickly find the answer to your own question---and more quickly than waiting for a response to question posted to a newsgroup, too. These steps will save you time, and will also help ensure you have a good reputation with the folks that might be included to answer one of your future questions, a question not covered in these resources. Put another way, if you do not want your questions to be ignored in the future---and please remember that the folks in the newsgroups do not have to answer your questions---you won't want to "annoy the natives" by asking a question that has already been answered far more times more than you might have realized, or a question whose answer is readily available had you made a small effort.

When posting, please consider the following suggestions:

• There is no particularly reliable way to recall, erase, delete, or otherwise hide a message once it is emailed or once posted. Once your message has reached an external email server or multiple news servers, the entire text is effectively a permanent fixture of the network. And using the available search engines, a fixture that is easy to locate and to correlate. (Do not assume that all tools or archives will honor the do-not-cache attributes, either---postings marked as such can be among the most interesting ones to cache, after all.)
  For details on some of the many available archives, please see Section 1.2.3.
• Include a valid e-mail address in the text of your posting or in a "signature" appended to the end. Reply-to addresses in headers often get garbled. Anonymous addresses can also simply be ignored, as fake addresses are regularly used by folks that are "trolling" and by folks that are spamming. (Though to avoid spam-harvesting of your email address, consider adding characters or a field into the address---but remember to include details around which characters or fields should be removed or altered if you decide to be particularly clever here.)
• If you are submitting a question, please be as specific as you can. Include relevant information such as processor type, product versions (OpenVMS and layered products that apply), error message(s), DCL command(s) used, and a short, reproducible example of problems. Say what you've tried so far, so that effort isn't duplicated. Keep in mind that there's not yet a telepathy protocol for the Internet. (The more detailed your description, the better that people can help you with your question.)
• If responding to a posting, include in your reply only as much of the original posting as is necessary to establish context. As a guideline, consider that if you've included more text than you've added, you've possibly included too much. Never include signatures and other irrelevant material.
• Please be polite. If the question isn't worded the way you think is correct or doesn't include the information you want, try to imagine what the problem might be if viewed from the poster's perspective. Requests for additional detailed information are often better sent through mail rather than posted to the newsgroup.
• If you have a problem with HP (or any other vendor's) product, please use the appropriate support channel. Do not assume that newsgroup postings will get read, will be responded to by the appropriate developers, or will be later followed up upon.
• If you are posting from a web browser, news reader or if you are posting via email sent to INFO-VAX, please turn off MIME, vcard, attachments, and other mechanisms that assume anyone reading the post has the corresponding capability---use the text-only option of your web browser, news reader, or mailer. Usenet is traditionally a text-only medium, and many news://comp.os.vms/ participants will use tools that have this support disabled, or that do not have this support. If the message uses MIME or attachments or such, the text of your message will be buried in a large pile of gibberish, and some tools will send multiple copies of the text within a single posting.
• If you find that the postings of a particular user are uninteresting, annoying, or off-topic, most newsreaders include a filter or killfile mechanism, and many mail clients have similar filtering capabilities. Please do not "flame"---to email or to post vitriol -- any individual that might annoy you, please enable and filter all of that user's postings. Posting of vitriol and of "flames" will eventually come back to haunt you; netizens and the net itself have a very large and a very long memory. Similarly, readers that decide that your postings are not worthy of reading will similarly tend to filter or to killfile all of your postings. Please play nice, in other words.

Before posting your question to the news://comp.os.vms/ newsgroup or sending your message to the INFO-VAX list, also please take the time to review available etiquette information, such as that included in the following documents:

• ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/
  news.answers/usenet/primer/part1
• ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/
  news.answers/usenet/faq/part1
• ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/
  news.answers/usenet/emily-postnews/part1
• ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/
  news.answers/usenet/writing-style/part1
• ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/
  news.answers/usenet/posting-rules/part1

This information will document the etiquette of newsgroups, as well as providing you with the knowledge the vast amount of newsgroup-related information that is readily available to you, and where to find it...