I have raw microfocus cobol data file and copybook from old unix server. And wants to read it raw on pc without cobol.
As I scan the file header, found out this is idx format 8 file with compression. How to read this file?
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You can read this file by re-engineering the format. If you don't want to do this you may use a library which provides MF IDX file format access (there are others than MF). Is there a specific reason despite the possibly interesting re-engineering to read it "without COBOL"? If you just want to get to the data there's likely an unload tool on the old unix server to convert the file to text. If you show the copybook (or at least all non-repeating parts you may get some additional information how to handle the data). – Simon Sobisch Nov 10 '17 at 14:38
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Nah, I don't have access to the server anymore, it's likely dead. And I want to recover as much as possible from our backup data. Re-engineering the format is what I'm going todo, but it's difficult since its compressed CBLDC001 and IDX Format 8 from what I read have embedded index. So I can't make sense the data in hex editor. A pointer is greatly appreciated. – flamemyst Nov 11 '17 at 07:04
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In this case (you only want to recover) I'd suggest to get a time-limited "evaluation" version of a MF compiler. You may even get tools to unload shipped, and if not may should be able to unload the file with a little bit of COBOL (for any non-MF tool you likely have to know about the actual index structure, too. I assume the copybook [which you still haven't shown at least in parts] only has the record layout in, correct? – Simon Sobisch Nov 11 '17 at 15:13