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jim haire · Beginner Joined: 30 Dec 2002 Posts: 140 Topics: 40

I am running a REXX command in the foreground. I am accepting a number (supposedly in binary format) and then calling a subroutine which attempt to convert it to decimal.

I am purposely not sending it a valid binary number, because I want to return control to the calling program and have it display a message saying that the number sent was not a binary number if it encounters that condition.

Instead I am getting as follows:

kolusu · Posted: Mon May 23, 2011 2:31 pm Post subject:

jim haire,

Check the number using DATATYPE and see if it is 1 for valid binary number

jim haire · Beginner Joined: 30 Dec 2002 Posts: 140 Topics: 40

Not quite what I'm looking for, but you've given me some ideas about how to check for this. I'll experiment with a few of these types.

When I said binary, I really meant COMP and COMP-4 type values. So the value +2222 is a hex 08AE.

I am going to want to do the same type of check for packed (COMP-3) numbers, that is, verifying when a user says a number is a PACKED number it really is packed.

In both of these cases, you cannot tell what type of number it is by visually looking at it.

papadi · Supermod Joined: 20 Oct 2009 Posts: 594 Topics: 1

Possibly, i'm way off base here, but is not every value from x'0000' to x'FFFF' a valid binary (comp) value?

When considering valid packed-decimal data (comp-3), it is the usage that detrmines the datatype. The system does not care about the 1s and 0s that reside in memory or on some media. It is only when they are used as one type or another that problems occur.
_________________
All the best,

di

jim haire · Beginner Joined: 30 Dec 2002 Posts: 140 Topics: 40

You are correct. In the program I am writing, I am asking the user if they are working with binary, packed, or display (readable) numbers. It also checks for sign overpunched when looking at display types.

If I can do the conversion, I can determine if what I returned from the conversion was numeric. However, feeding bad values to the conversion routine causes the program to stop and display the line that caused the error.

It would be great if I had some way to allow the program to continue when an error like this is encountered and handle the error on my own.

papadi · Supermod Joined: 20 Oct 2009 Posts: 594 Topics: 1

My users expect to enter a number (say a quantity or an amount). They do not expect to enter how this number is stored internally?

Dibakar · Posted: Tue May 24, 2011 3:37 pm Post subject:

http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/zos/v1r11/index.jsp?topic=/com.ibm.zos.r11.ikja300/c2d.htm

bob_buxton · Posted: Tue May 24, 2011 3:42 pm Post subject:

jim haire · Beginner Joined: 30 Dec 2002 Posts: 140 Topics: 40

Sorry I didn't get back sooner. Had some higher priority work, but finally got to test out some of your responses,

I couldn't get the SIGNAL ON to work for this example. I tried SIGNAL ON ERROR NAME BINERROR and SIGNAL ON FAILURE NAME BINERROR and neither of them would pass me to the BINERROR label. I tried putting this statement before the offending statement and after the offending statement. I also tried at the very beginning of the program. None of them worked. I don't know if this is the type of error REXX expects to capture.

I did increase the number of NUMERIC DIGITS to 20 and it did help in some situations. It will still abend if I choose a binary number that is too large, but I don't see that happening.

This type of error sort of reminds me of the COBOL divide by zero error. If you hadn't edited properly and perform a statement that causes division by zero, your program abends and you have no way of stopping it from abending.

Thanks for all your responses.

RonB · Posted: Wed Jun 01, 2011 10:12 am Post subject:

jim haire · Beginner Joined: 30 Dec 2002 Posts: 140 Topics: 40

Thanks. I didn't know this and will use it the next time I could encounter this error.

arnold57 · Beginner Joined: 01 Oct 2004 Posts: 30 Topics: 0

You are getting a syntax error, so you should use