Task attributes are entities that record various properties of a process, such as its usercode, mix number, priority, printing defaults, and so on.

There are a limited number of task attributes, which are defined by the operating system and have fixed meanings. Each process possesses all of these task attributes, but the values of the task attributes can vary. For example, each process has a USERCODE task attribute, but where one process might have a USERCODE value of JASMITH, another process might have a USERCODE value of JANEDOE.

Task attributes record or modify many aspects of process execution, including security, processor usage, memory usage, and I/O activity. You can assign task attributes to a process either through commands entered at an interactive source, or through statements in a program.

This guide introduces many of the important uses of task attributes. The remaining sections in Part I of this guide introduce task attributes within discussions of general functional areas, such as processor usage, memory usage, and so on. For detailed information about any of these task attributes, you can refer to the sections later in this guide, which present the task attributes in alphabetical order.