Free Form Definitions

One of the major new features of ILE RPG, introduced in 7.1, is free form definition specifications.

Features

• Removes the column restrictions on definitions.
• Can be interspersed with standard, fixed form, definitions.
• /free and /end-free no longer required.

Requirements

• IBM i 7.1 or higher.
• 7.1 PTF 5770WDS SI51094.
• If using SQLRPGLE, 7.1 PTF Group SF99701 level 26 or higher.

Free-Form Definitions

• CTL-OPT ... the free-form version of H-specs.
• DCL-F ....... the free-form version of F-specs
• DCL-C ....... the free-form version of D-spec constants
• DCL-S ....... the free-form version of D-spec stand-alone fields
• DCL-DS .... the free-form version of D-spec data structures
• END-DS .... a new statement to terminate most DCL-DS statements
• DCL-PI ...... the free-form version of D-spec procedure interface definitions
• END-PI ..... a new statement to terminate procedure interface definitions
• DCL-PR .... the free-form version of D-spec procedure prototype definitions
• END-PR .... a new statement to procedure prototype definitions
• DCL-PROC .. the free-form version of P-spec begin statements
• END-PROC .. the free-form version of P-spec end statements

Examples

<source lang="rpg">

    D* fixed-form declarations
    D string        S       50A VARYING 
    D date          S         D DATFMT(*MDY) 
    D obj           S         O CLASS(*JAVA:'MyClass') 
    D ptr           S         * PROCPTR 
   
      // free-form declarations 
      DCL-S string VARCHAR(50); 
      DCL-S date DATE(*MDY); 
      DCL-S obj OBJECT(*JAVA:'MyClass'); 
      DCL-S ptr POINTER(*PROC);
    
      // constants
      DCL-C max_count 200; 
      DCL-C deleted 'D'; 

</source >

Links

Dawn May: Free format RPG and TR7

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