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#679 Provide a way to allow the Classic Rexx 'extra characters' in varnames

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2017-02-03
2016-10-25
LesK
No

In many places, including official ooRexx documents, it is asserted, or strongly implied, that ooRexx is backward compatible with Classic (mainframe) Rexx, but ooRexx doesn't allow @#$ cent-sign
characters in varnames, thus creating a severe obstacle to its acceptence by the sizable community
of Classic Rexx users.

We need a way to configure ooRexx to allow these characters, as allowed by the ANSI Standard.
Obviously, thy perfect solution would make it easy for the user to turn on and off without
modifying the source code.

Discussion

  • Rony G. Flatscher

    Rony G. Flatscher - 2017-02-03

    If allowing these "mainframe Rexx" characters it means at the same time that these characters could never be used in ooRexx for future syntax changes/additions anymore!

    E.g. the "@" character has become very popular in most programming languages to be used for annotations (meta information added to all sort of syntactical elements). It might be conceivable that sometimes in the future this character could be used in ooRexx for similiar purposes as long as it is available (e.g. as an optional enhancement of the ::annotation directive in ooRexx 5beta).

    Maybe an alternative to allow mainframe-Rexx programs to run on ooRexx would be to allow some sort of rewriting/mapping Rexx symbols that contain these "mainframe characters", either in ooRexx directly or with the help of Rexx-related tools.

     

  • LesK

    LesK - 2017-02-03

    I don't see the conflict that you imagine might occur at some time in the future.
    Directives would seem to be outside the scope of the allowable characters in a varname.
    Of course I have the tools to make Classic Rexx code compatible with ooRexx, but that doesn't
    help someone else who wants to smoothly transition from Classic Rexx to ooRexx.

     

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