JOB Statement | JOB Card

A JOB statement with all its parameters is also called as JOB Card.
A JOB card makes the OS aware of the specific job after it submits and provides the parameters required to run the job.
It is the first statement in the job and should always code as the first statement.
It is mandatory for the job to run and should code only once.
A JOB card is used to -
- Identify the JOB uniquely.
- Provide accounting information.
- Provide the parameters treated as global and applies to the entire JOB.
- Provide information about how to run the job.
- Identify the user information who is responsible for the job.
- And many more.
JOB card can be coded in multiple lines with a continuation character (,) immediately after the parameter anywhere from 17 to 72 columns.

Syntax -

----+----1----+---2---+---3---+----4----+---5---+
//job-name JOB  job-card-parameters

The JOB statement is divided into three parts -

JOB Name (job-name) -

JOB name is the first word in the JOB statement and is used to identify the job.
JOB name starts from the 3rd column and ends at the 10th column.
The JOB name length can be a minimum of 1 character and a maximum of 8 characters.
JOB name can be anything from the following -
- Next available name in the system for PROD jobs.
- Userid of the user who submitted the JOB (in the test environment).
- Task name that is completed by the specific JOB.

There are no specific rules for naming a job. The job names and the member name are mostly the same. For example -

JOB Operation -

JOB Card Parameters -

JOB Card parameters are treated as global and applies to each step in the job.
If any parameter is coded at the step and JOB level, the step level parameter has the highest priority.
The JOB card parameter is ignored if a step is coded with the same parameter.
JOB Card parameters are divided into two types -
- Positional parameters.
- Keyword parameters.

Example -