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More context on the issue:
When you clone a repository from GitHub to z/OS UNIX, Git stores filenames using UTF-8 encoding, as is standard on most Unix-like systems. However, many z/OS-based tools—such as IDz, Java (when running with file.encoding=IBM-1047), and IBM DBB—expect filenames to be encoded in the system's default locale, typically IBM-1047.
If the filename contains only basic ASCII characters (letters, numbers, and common punctuation), these map 1:1 between UTF-8 and IBM-1047, so EBCDIC-based tools can generally interpret them correctly. But if the filename includes non-ASCII characters (such as "Å"), Git encodes it as a multi-byte UTF-8 sequence (e.g., Å = 0xC3 0x85), which EBCDIC-based tools misinterpret as two unrelated single-byte IBM-1047 characters (e.g., Ã and some undefined character). This results in corrupted or unreadable filenames.
This mismatch doesn't occur when filenames are created and read entirely by EBCDIC-native tools, because both operations use the same encoding (IBM-1047). The issue arises specifically when EBCDIC-based tools (like Java or DBB) try to read filenames written by Git or other tools that operate in UTF-8.
Git currently has no built-in option to store filenames using a different code page. A potential enhancement would be a setting such as:
git config core.fileencoding IBM-1047
This would instruct Git to convert filenames to IBM-1047 when writing them to the filesystem.
Another important consideration is that many EBCDIC tools (such as DBB) rely on Java, and Java 21 defaults to UTF-8 for file encoding. If Java is run in its default UTF-8 mode (file.encoding=UTF-8), it can correctly interpret Git-created filenames, which may avoid the issue altogether—as long as all tools in the toolchain also operate in UTF-8.