MVSFORUMS.com

kolusu · Posted: Fri May 14, 2004 11:31 am Post subject: COBOL value clause limit

I was under the impression that the value clause can have 16,777,215 bytes for a field defined as alphanumeric. The same can be found here Compiler limits .Today I found that you cannot have more than 160 bytes for the value clause.

To elaborate more the following code compiles with out any problem.

slade · Posted: Sun May 16, 2004 7:54 pm Post subject:

Hi Kolusu,

Since you've solved the problem already, this is just an exercise.

Don't know the specifics of your situation, but could you cut & paste into a small file (or maybe it's already in machine readable form) and do a ref/mod read/move loop into the pic x(800) field?

Regards, Jack.

kolusu · Posted: Mon May 17, 2004 10:53 am Post subject:

Jack,

I had no problems moving from a file to the 800 byte field with reference modification. It works fine. Even this also works fine.

slade · Posted: Wed May 19, 2004 3:49 pm Post subject:

Hi Kolusu,

I don't have a manual handy and it might have been a typo on your part, but don't you need a closing quote for the AAA... literal?

Could that be the problem?

Regards, Jack.

kolusu · Posted: Wed May 19, 2004 4:11 pm Post subject:

Slade,

You don't need a closing quote as blanks at the end of each continued line are counted as part of the literal because the continued lines do not end with a quotation mark.

Check this link which explains the rules for continuation.

http://publibz.boulder.ibm.com/cgi-bin/bookmgr_OS390/BOOKS/igy3lr10/1.5.4.2.1?SHELF=&DT=20020920180651&CASE=

Kolusu
_________________
Kolusu
www.linkedin.com/in/kolusu

Maton_Man · Beginner Joined: 30 Jan 2004 Posts: 123 Topics: 0

Why don't you offer to fix it for them... Smile

_________________
My opinions are exactly that.

Maton_Man · Beginner Joined: 30 Jan 2004 Posts: 123 Topics: 0

I just did a search of the manual and came up with the following which is tantalizingly coincidental

kolusu · Posted: Thu May 20, 2004 4:58 am Post subject:

Maton_Man,

I wish I had the ability to fix it. Smile

Theortically I should be able to populate the value, but the hidden compiler limitation does not allow that.

Kolusu
_________________
Kolusu
www.linkedin.com/in/kolusu

slade · Posted: Thu May 20, 2004 9:06 pm Post subject:

Hi Kolusu,

Have you tried a closing quote on the final line of the lit? I know the rule supports your contention, but I find it curious that each of their examples show a closing quote for the lit. It's typical IBM to skirt these kinds of issues.

Their discussion of variable length records processing is a typical case in point.

Regards, Jack.

kolusu · Posted: Fri May 21, 2004 5:17 am Post subject:

slade,

I did have a closing quote for all my examples. Once I have more than 3 lines of data , pgm did not compile. It worked fine with 3 lines of value clause

Kolusu
_________________
Kolusu
www.linkedin.com/in/kolusu

William Collins · Supermod Joined: 03 Jun 2012 Posts: 437 Topics: 0

I happened to be researching this, and came across this topic.

As indicated earlier in the topic, an alphanumeric literal is limited to 160 bytes. This is in the 1985 ANSI Standard,

When specifying a VALUE with a literal... you run into the limit not of the VALUE clause, but of the alphanumeric literal. It is the size of the literal itself that is the problem. With a figurative constant, or ALL as was shown, there is no problem with the size.

160 bytes is a limit of the Standard, not of the compiler. In the '68 Standard, it was a compiler-implementation limit. In the '74 Standard, it was specified, as 120, for a "non-numeric literal". In '85 extended to 160 for an alphanumeric literal (change of name). In 2014, it is 8191.

The Compiler Limits is a little confusing:

Total 01 + 77 (data items) No limit
88 condition-names . . . No limit
VALUE literal . . . No limit

I think what this means is there is no compiler limit to the number of VALUE clauses. There is of course another compiler limit which will affect that anyway, which is 999,999 lines of source.

Splitting the field into smaller items seems a better way to get a long literal.