I am trying to create DFDL definition for COBOL copy book and have experienced a usability issue with TextNumberFormat which have to be named and referenced from dfdl:element and dfdl:simpleType annotations. Consider a sample COBOL copy book, attached below, where I have 3 elements having PIC 9999 display clause (a.k.a zoned decimal) and 2 external (standard) decimal. They all have same length but the main difference between them is number is sign which could leading or trailing. As per the V.38 spec, I would have to create a named textNumberFormat for each of the picture clause. The key difference in the named textNumberFormats for these definitions would be numberPattern and rest of the attributes for standard decimal and zoned decimal are going to be same for a particular platform or data definition format. The generated DFDL schema will be containing many occurrences of TextNumberFormat and in the worst case scenario one for each element defined in the COBOL copy book. This is not very usable and also user would have to carefully choose the name for these formats so he can easily identify and distinguish if wants to resue them something like TextNumberStandardLength5SignLeading etc.. 01 CobolTypes. * External decimal ( Zoned decimal) 05 elem9 PIC 9999 DISPLAY. 05 elem9Signed PIC S9999 DISPLAY. 05 elem9SignedLeading PIC S9999 DISPLAY SIGN LEADING. * in DFDL - modeled as standard decimal 05 elem9SignedLeadingSeparate PIC S9999 DISPLAY SIGN LEADING SEPARATE. 05 elem9SignedTrailingSeparate PIC S9999 DISPLAY SIGN TRAILING SEPARATE. Number Format When textNumberRepresentation is ‘zoned’ only the pattern for positive numbers is used. Only the following pattern characters may be used: '+' to indicate whether the leading or trailing digit carries the overpunched sign, 'V' to indicate the location of an implied decimal point and '0' to indicate the number of digits (including overpunched). The number is '0' characters must match the number of digits in the representation otherwise it is a schema definition error. Better approach would be Add numberPattern to dfdl:element and dfdl:simpleType annotation and rest of the attributes from TextNumberFormat block to either a) dfdl:format only or (b) both dfdl:format and dfdl:element and dfdl:simpleType. Let's discuss this in the DFDL workgroup call tomorrow .. Attached below is a schema coded with the assumption (a) listed above.. <xsd:complexType name="CobolTypes"> <xsd:sequence> <!---------------- External Decimal --------------------------------> <xsd:element name="elem9" dfdl:ref= "dfdlCobolFmt:CobolZonedDecimalFormat" dfdl:length="4" dfdl:representation="text" dfdl:numberPattern="0000"> <xsd:simpleType> <xsd:restriction base="xsd:short"> <xsd:minInclusive value= "0" /> <xsd:maxInclusive value= "9999" /> </xsd:restriction> </xsd:simpleType> </xsd:element> <xsd:element name="elem9Signed" dfdl:ref= "dfdlCobolFmt:CobolZonedDecimalFormat" dfdl:length="4" dfdl:representation="text" dfdl:numberPattern="0000+" > <xsd:simpleType> <xsd:restriction base="xsd:short"> <xsd:minInclusive value= "-9999" /> <xsd:maxInclusive value= "9999" /> </xsd:restriction> </xsd:simpleType> </xsd:element> <xsd:element name="elem9SignedLeading" dfdl:ref= "dfdlCobolFmt:CobolZonedDecimalFormat" dfdl:length="4" dfdl:representation="text" dfdl:numberPattern="+0000"> <xsd:simpleType> <xsd:restriction base="xsd:short"> <xsd:minInclusive value= "-9999" /> <xsd:maxInclusive value= "9999" /> </xsd:restriction> </xsd:simpleType> </xsd:element> <xsd:element name="elem9SignedLeadingSeparate" dfdl:ref="dfdlCobolFmt:CobolStandardDecimalFormat" dfdl:length="5" dfdl:representation="text" dfdl:numberPattern="+0000;-00000" > <xsd:simpleType> <xsd:restriction base="xsd:short"> <xsd:minInclusive value= "-9999" /> <xsd:maxInclusive value= "9999" /> </xsd:restriction> </xsd:simpleType> </xsd:element> <xsd:element name="elem9SignedTrailingSeparate" dfdl:ref="dfdlCobolFmt:CobolStandardDecimalFormat" dfdl:length="5" dfdl:representation="text" dfdl:numberPattern="0000+;00000-"> <xsd:simpleType> <xsd:restriction base="xsd:short"> <xsd:minInclusive value= "-9999" /> <xsd:maxInclusive value= "9999" /> </xsd:restriction> </xsd:simpleType> </xsd:element> ----- Data format Definitions <xsd:defineFormat name= "CobolStandardDecimalFormat"> <xsd:format ref= "tns:BaseTextNumberStandardDecimal" dfdl:lengthKind="explicit" dfdl:lengthUnits="bytes" dfdl:alignment="1" dfdl:alignmentUnits="bytes" dfdl:leadingSkipBytes="0" dfdl:trailingSkipBytes="0" /> </xsd:defineFormat> <xsd:defineFormat name="CobolZonedDecimalFormat"> <xsd:format ref= "tns:BaseTextNumberZonedDecimal" dfdl:lengthKind="explicit" dfdl:lengthUnits="bytes" dfdl:alignment="1" dfdl:alignmentUnits="bytes" dfdl:leadingSkipBytes="0" dfdl:trailingSkipBytes="0" /> </xsd:defineFormat> -- Text number Formats ( added here for reference to identify applicable attributes for standard and zoned decimal) <xsd:defineTextNumberFormat name= "ZonedDecimalNumberFormat"> <xsd:textNumberFormat numberCheckPolicy= "lax" numberRoundingMode="roundUp" numberZonedSignStyle= "asciiStandard" /> </xsd:defineTextNumberFormat> <xsd:defineTextNumberFormat name= "StandardDecimalFormat"> <xsd:textNumberFormat numberGroupingSeparator="," numberDecimalSeparator="." numberExponentCharacter="E" numberCheckPolicy="lax" numberInfinityRep="\u221E" numberNanRep="\uFFFD" numberRoundingMode="roundUp" numberZeroRep="" "" /> </xsd:defineTextNumberFormat> Suman Kalia IBM Toronto Lab WMB Toolkit Architect and Development Lead WebSphere Business Integration Application Connectivity Tools http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/websphere/zones/businessintegration/wmb.ht... Tel : 905-413-3923 T/L 969-3923 Fax : 905-413-4850 T/L 969-4850 Internet ID : kalia@ca.ibm.com