The text read off it
[page 27]
It is not necessary that these three divisions appear as separate entities. If appropriate, the programmer may write a portion of one, then a portion of another, and so on. However, each such portion must be properly labeled with a division header. Each header consists of the name of the division, preceded by an asterisk. The three division headers are:
*PROCEDURE
*DATA
*ENVIRONMENT
These names are written, where required, in the “name margin” of the form used for the procedure description, as explained in Chapter 3, or in the name columns of the form used for the data description, as explained in Chapter 4. In other words, the asterisk always appears in the left-most name column, followed immediately by the remainder of the header.
All entries following a division header are assumed to be a part of the specified division.
Punctuation and Spacing
The punctuation of Commercial Translator sentences is reasonably simple and, for the most part, self-evident. It may be summarized in the following rules:
- All words are separated by blanks, or by any character which cannot legally be used in a word, such as an arithmetic operator. (See the rules for forming names, beginning on page 15.)
- Multiple blanks are treated as single blanks, except within alphameric literals, where each blank will be treated as a separate character. (Numeric literals cannot contain any blanks.)
- Each sentence must be terminated by a period, followed by a blank. Should the blank be omitted, the period will be treated as an “imbedded period,” except where the period is found in Column 72 of the procedure description form.
- The “imbedded period”—i.e., a period surrounded by non-blank characters—serves one of two functions, depending on the context: (1) If it appears in a “word” consisting wholly of numerals, or in a floating point number, it will be treated as a decimal point. (2) In any other context (except within a literal), it will serve as the equivalent of a hyphen—in other words, as the means of connecting separate parts of a simple name.
- Successive imperative clauses in a sentence must be separated by single commas; for the sake of clarity, the programmer may use blanks in addition, but they will be ignored.
- Arithmetic operators may be used with or without surrounding blanks. Blanks may be used for the sake of clarity, as in the expression A + B * C, but they will be ignored; this expression could therefore be written A+B*C. However, the programmer must not write two successive arithmetic operators unless the second of them is either the operator TR or the operator ABS. Where the effect of two successive operators is required, one term may be enclosed in parentheses; thus, while the expression A * -B is illegal, the same value may be written A * (-B). The minus sign in this case could have been followed by a blank, but the notation given is customary.