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I mean in V5R1, V5R2 and V5R3 there are subtle "enhancements" to the language that are all related (such as the example above) in which partial solutions are introduced in a point release and then the next part of the solution is introduced in the next point release and so on.

No kidding. I'm very tired of these "half-written" features that RPG seems to get.

At various releases we have had all of the following:

- Pointers without pointer arithmetic
- No MOVE in free-format, but no way to convert char to number
- %char() not converting numbers to character
- %dec() and %int() not converting character to number.
- %dec() and %int() not converting dates to numbers
- DSPLY op-code and requirement for at least a space in the factor 1
- Read data into a data structure, but only for program described files
- Read data into a DS, but only if you use the record format name and LIKEREC
- Prototypes, but no way to pass a data structure.
- LIKEDS but not with an array.
- LIKEDS with an array, but no LOOKUP or SORTA

It just seems like they leave out things that they know people will need. They introduce half of what we need at once, and introduce the rest at some point in the future.

This leads to poor adoption of the new techniques, because they're awkward at first. Once they become less awkward, people don't adopt them because they have to remain compatible with old releases.

It also leads to it being difficult to teach anything, because you have to teach people 10 different ways of doing everything.

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