verify the STRING in COBOL

kumar_jalluri · New User Joined: 02 Jun 2005 Posts: 24 Location: PUNE

Hi,

I need to verify a string for characters 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B C D E F.

If the string is having other than this characters, I have some processing. other wise I have different process.

Could you please let me know how to do it in COBOL

Thanks

Robert Sample · Posted: Tue Jun 08, 2010 4:29 pm

Your first problem is that COBOL does not have strings. COBOL has variables that can be numeric, alphanumeric, national, DBCS ... but never string. Terminology is critical in IT where similar sounding terms may mean very different things -- so you need to use appropriate terminology first.

Assuming you meant an alphanumeric variable, you have two choices:
1) redefine as an array of one-byte variables and check each byte individually.
2) use reference modification to check each individual byte of the variable.

dbzTHEdinosauer · Posted: Tue Jun 08, 2010 4:48 pm

you could also, within the SPECIAL-NAMES paragraph
use the CLASS clause

dbzTHEdinosauer · Posted: Tue Jun 08, 2010 5:15 pm

miss-reading of the manuals is the root cause of this.

string
array
are two examples.

always in the manuals:
string data items refer to java or c items
array is a java-array-object.

yet when the word (string-data-item and java-array-object) is used without
the full qualifier,
people tend to think that it is ok to use the abbreviation to refer to COBOL objects:

noncobol - cobol
string - alphanumeric data item
array - cobol internal table

as with so many other terms (jcl for example),
people tend to use what is convenient for them,
until they try searching on a term that does not exist.

GuyC · Posted: Tue Jun 08, 2010 7:56 pm

just an idea :

kumar_jalluri · New User Joined: 02 Jun 2005 Posts: 24 Location: PUNE

Thanks... It is working for above logic.