Re: Moving SPACES in numerical fields

Hi Miklas:

Here is the reason why:              

If you move space to a numeric field in COBOL, the compiler substitutes it with 
zeroes. The following copiletime message is given:

MSGID: LBL0481  SEVERITY: 20  SEQNBR:  006200                    
Message . . . . :   'SPACE' should not be moved to a numeric or  
  numeric edited field. Zero substituted.          

If you move space to a group item, any numeric field inside will be unnumeric 
and will fail in moves/computes.

Regards

Geir

-----Original Message-----
From: cobol400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx 
[mailto:cobol400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Roman Miklos
Sent: Monday, October 16, 2006 1:00 PM
To: COBOL Programming on the iSeries/AS400
Subject: [COBOL400-L] Moving SPACES in numerical fields


Hallo,

I have a little question about moving SPACES in numerical fields, maybe 
for beginners, but I  nowhere found a clear answer
:-)
To ilustrate it first here is a little sample:

       IDENTIFICATION DIVISION.
       PROGRAM-ID. RECURTEST.
       ENVIRONMENT DIVISION.
       CONFIGURATION SECTION.
       SOURCE-COMPUTER. IBM-AS400.
       OBJECT-COMPUTER. IBM-AS400.
       SPECIAL-NAMES.
       DATA DIVISION.
       WORKING-STORAGE SECTION.
       01  PSSDPO-RECORD.
           05 PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-GRP.
              10 PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-INPT.
                 15 PSSDPO-KONTROLOR         PIC 9(10).
              10 PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-OUTP REDEFINES
                  PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-INPT.
                 15 PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-EDIT
                                            PIC 9999999999.


       LINKAGE SECTION.
       PROCEDURE DIVISION.
      * Initialize Group-Items
           INITIALIZE PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-GRP.
      * Move SPACE into numeric field
           MOVE SPACE TO PSSDPO-KONTROLOR.
           MOVE SPACE TO PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-EDIT.
      * Move SPACE do Group-Item
           MOVE SPACE TO PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-INPT.
           MOVE SPACE TO PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-OUTP.
           GOBACK.

1)  After the move in a numerical item e.g.:
MOVE SPACE TO PSSDPO-KONTROLOR.
The SPACE is treated such as the ZERO, i.e. PSSDPO-KONTROLOR has a value 
PSSDPO-KONTROLOR = 0000000000

2) After the move in the group item 
MOVE SPACE TO PSSDPO-KONTROLOR-INPT.
Thu numerical field is filled with blanks i.e. PSSDPO-KONTROLOR =  .

a) Why didn't I get in case of 1) an error (e.g. 'Decimal data error') and 
why is SPACE treated as ZERO?

b) Is the numerical field in case of 2) treated as character field because 
it's part of a group item?

Regards

Roman
Mgr. Ing. Roman MIKLÓŠ 
Prvá stavebná sporiteľňa a.s. 
Bajkalská 30, P. O. Box 48 
829 48  Bratislava 25 
Tel.: +421/ 2 / 582 31 174 
Fax: +421/ 2 / 582 31 109