# NEE COBOL application set up **URL:** \ **Category:** Forum\ **Tags:** Adabas-Natural, Natural, Natural-Add-on-Products, Natural-Engineer, Natural-Other-Addons\ **Created:** [November 15, 2012, 4:20pm UTC](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/t/nee-cobol-application-set-up/101749 "2012-11-15T16:20:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Debbie\_Jordan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Debbie\_Jordan](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/u/Debbie_Jordan)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2012, 4:20pm UTC](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/t/nee-cobol-application-set-up/101749/1 "2012-11-15T16:20:19Z")
Hi, Am trying to create a cobol app in engineer and I know what the PDS name of the cobol source code is, but have no idea what I’m supposed to use for the alias, which is evidently a compulsory field. Any suggestions please as to where I would find this information? ta, DJ ---
**Author:** ![Brian\_James](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Brian\_James](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/u/Brian_James)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2012, 4:38pm UTC](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/t/nee-cobol-application-set-up/101749/2 "2012-11-15T16:38:03Z")
Hi You can set the Alias to be any name you like - up to 8 bytes. Internally this is stored on the objects control record rather than the potential 44 byte PDS name. So, if extracting COBOL from Application ABC, why not ABCPDS as the Alias for the Source members and ABCPROC for the PDS where the Procedures are located. It’s up to you - but make them unique within an application. HTH BJ ---
**Author:** ![Debbie\_Jordan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Debbie\_Jordan](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/u/Debbie_Jordan)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 3:40pm UTC](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/t/nee-cobol-application-set-up/101749/3 "2012-11-16T15:40:00Z")
Hi Brian, long time no chat 🙂 Have applied the alais as you recommend and that works ok, but the app is now refusing to actually extract any cobol from the PDS (PanValet based), so if you get a chance, please can you take a look at the attachment and see if there’s anything else I’m doing wrong, ta, Debs [COB APP.docx](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/uploads/short-url/ukPqVOc20Ag6qVFd8o126CRPpO6.docx) (123 KB) ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/techcommunity/original/3X/c/d/cd19967bb605d28a72d77eb83a1cae22f3df2eb8.svg) [@system](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2021, 3:02pm UTC](https://techcommunity.softwareag.com/t/nee-cobol-application-set-up/101749/4 "2021-04-02T15:02:34Z")