Looking for an alternative to your current, expensive 4GL product? If you want an economical alternative to SAS or one of the older products that CA aquired (Easytrieve Plus, VISION:Results, VISION:Report, CA-Earl) we have great news for you! Spectrum Writer can provide you with the same ad-hoc 4GL reporting abilities at a much lower cost.

Spectrum Writer is the 4GL report writer and file-format utility for z/OS and VSE mainframes.

Spectrum Writer is much more economical than those other reporting products. And yet it provides the same powerful report writing and file formatting abilities — including powerful date and string manipulation functions — found in much more expensive products. In fact, Spectrum Writer has several new Web and export features that your current product may not have.

Spectrum Writer features a simple syntax that is easy to learn and use. Your programmers will be up and running with Spectrum Writer in no time. It is also written entirely in fast, efficient Assembler language to be easy on your CPU. And best of all, it comes from a friendly, easy to deal with, personal service oriented software company. Pacific Systems Group has a 20-plus year history of providing inexpensive, rock solid mainframe software, backed up with first class service and support.

  • Use Spectrum Writer to:
  • create brand-new custom reports or queries in just minutes
  • create custom files by mixing, combining, extracting and reformatting your flat files, VSAM files and DB2 tables
  • compute your own new fields using powerful built-in functions
  • get break-wide and report-wide statistics
  • turn any of your mainframe data into Web reports (HTML format)
  • convert your mainframe data into ASCII files (comma-delimited or fixed format) for use in:
    • spreadsheet programs like Excel and Lotus
    • database programs like Microsoft Access
    • e-mail attachments
    • Oracle databases
    • Unix Web servers
    • any other mainframe, mini, or PC application that requires a custom file format
  • use existing COBOL or Assembler record layouts as your data dictionary  

To see more details about replacing your specific 4GL product (including FAQs, sample programs that we have converted, conversion tips and online conversion tools), please follow one of these links:



See for yourself why Spectrum Writer is already in use at over 300 mainframe shops worldwide. Follow these links to:

Attention Mainframe Software Vendors! Spectrum Writer is the ideal choice for adding custom reporting and file export functions to your own product. Learn more about OEM, VAR and bundling opportunities.