DFSORT Licensing Overview

Who Handles Licensing?

Licensing is typically handled by your organization's system programming, procurement, or IT licensing team. They negotiate and maintain the contract with IBM (and any third-party vendors). As an application programmer, you do not usually deal with license terms directly. You use the sort product that is installed and licensed at your site. If you are told to use a specific product (e.g. "use DFSORT, not Syncsort") or to avoid certain features for license reasons, your support team will communicate that.

IBM DFSORT

DFSORT is supplied by IBM. It may be included with z/OS or offered as a licensed program product (LPP). The exact packaging and license terms depend on your IBM agreement and the z/OS version. In many environments, DFSORT is available as the default sort utility, and batch jobs use PGM=SORT or PGM=ICEMAN to run it. Your site's license determines whether and how you can use it (e.g. for production, development, or testing).

Third-Party Sort Products

Some sites license a third-party sort product instead of or in addition to DFSORT. A common one is Syncsort (from Precisely). These products often provide the same or similar JCL interface (e.g. PGM=SORT) and support similar control statement syntax, with some differences. The choice of product is usually made at the organizational level based on performance, cost, support, or legacy. From your perspective, you write JCL and control statements; the actual program that runs may be DFSORT or Syncsort depending on what is in the load library. The messages in SYSOUT (e.g. ICE for DFSORT, WER for Syncsort) identify which product ran.

What You Need to Know as a Programmer

For day-to-day development you need to know:

• Which sort product is available — Usually DFSORT or Syncsort (or both). Your site may have standards (e.g. "use DFSORT for all new jobs").
• That it is licensed — You are not responsible for the license, but you should use the product in line with your site's policies. If you need a different product or have a licensing question, contact your support or licensing team.
• Syntax differences — If your site uses Syncsort, some control statement syntax may differ slightly from DFSORT. Documentation and local standards will guide you. The tutorials on this site focus on DFSORT; equivalent Syncsort syntax may be similar but not identical.

Licensing and Installation Together

Licensing determines what your organization is allowed to use. Installation is what is actually loaded and available on the system. The two go together: your site licenses a product, then system programmers install it so that when you run PGM=SORT, that product runs. If a product is not licensed, it should not be installed (or used). If you get a "program not found" or a message about an unlicensed product, that is a matter for your system or licensing team to resolve.

Explain It Like I'm Five

Licensing is like having a permission slip to use the sorting machine. The company (your organization) gets the permission slip from the machine maker (IBM or another vendor). You don't get the slip yourself—the people who run the building (system programmers and licensing) do. You just use the machine that is there and that the company is allowed to use. If someone says "we can't use that machine anymore," they might be talking about the permission slip (license); you would then use whatever other machine (sort product) the company has permission to use.

Exercises

1. Who at your site would you ask about sort product licensing?
2. How might licensing affect whether you use DFSORT or Syncsort?
3. What do you need to know as an application programmer about the DFSORT (or Syncsort) license?
4. Why do SYSOUT messages (e.g. ICE vs WER) matter when talking about licensing?