Exit status

The IBM i programming model was originally based on an early object orientation model in which programs communicated through message passing, rather than using return codes. The introduction of the Integrated Language Programming (ILE) model lead to the definitions of common areas to exchange data as return code: the user and the program return code. For information about the user return code, see Controlling the job environment with JOBMANRC.

When the IBM i agent verifies that a submitted command or job is completed, it assigns an exit status to the job based on the job status of the completed job. For more information, see Job status.

The exit status is set depending on the completion message of the command or job. For a normal completion, the exit status is set to zero. For an abnormal completion, it is set to the value of the severity of the message related to the exception that caused the abnormal end of the job. The IBM i agent can also set the exit status to the value of the user return code when it is returned by the submitted command in the normal mode. The exit status value is visible in the trailer of the IBM i agent report for the job and sent back to the HCL Workload Automation master as return code.