RE: [open-cobol-list] RE: Question About Functions

[Roger While]

This is getting interesting. Had to dig through the 2002 standard -
**-- quote --**
8.7.1 Arithmetic operators
There are five binary arithmetic operators and two unary arithmetic 
operators that may be used in arithmetic
expressions. They are represented by specific COBOL characters that shall 
be preceded by a space and followed
by a space except that no space is required between a left parenthesis and 
a unary operator or between a unary
operator and a left parenthesis. The following are the arithmetic 
operators:
Binary Arithmetic Operators Meaning
+ Addition
– Subtraction
* Multiplication
/ Division
** Exponentiation
Unary Arithmetic Operators Meaning
+ The effect of multiplication by the numeric literal +1
– The effect of multiplication by the numeric literal –1
**-- end quote --**

Specifically the second sentence. Interesting, spaces are required.
And now -
Referring to Table 4 on page 120 which details allowable combinations
of symbols in expressions:
If the first symbol is + - * / or **. then the second symbol can be an
identifier/literal OR a unary + -.

So, we can have (partial) (quotes inserted for readability) -
" + - 1".

This leads me to think that the 2002 standard maybe allows/specifies 
unparsable grammar.
(Or at least forces one to sprinkle well-placed parentheses to achieve the 
result)
In fact, with regard to FUNCTION question, I can see potential problems.

Bill, can you comment on this ?

Roger


> Bill wrote :
> And isn't that NON-conforming?  Don't you need a "space" between the "-" 
> and
> "D" to make the minus an "binary operator"?