jobs

In a batch processing computer system, a job stream, jobstream, or simply job is the sequence of job control language statements (JCL) and data (called instream data) that comprise a single “unit of work for an operating system”. A job consists of the execution of one or more programs. Each program execution, called a job step, jobstep, or step, is usually related in some way to the others in the job. Steps in a job are executed sequentially, possibly depending on the results of previous steps. In the IBM z/OS operating system, a job is initiated by a // JOB and terminated by the next // JOB or // statement. Each job step consists of one // EXEC statement indicating the program to be executed and usually multiple // DD statements defining the files and devices to be used.