Program address identifier

Format

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ADDRESS OF PROGRAM {identifier-1 | literal-1}

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Syntax rules

1. identifier-1 must belong to the data category “alphanumeric” and must not be defined in the REPORT SECTION.
   If identifier-1 is the program name of an individual program or of the outermost program of a nested program (programs nested within others are not permissible), it must begin with an alphabetic character and can only contain uppercase letters and digits. The permissible length of the program name depends on the module format (see the "COBOL2000 User Guide" [1 ]).

2. literal-1 must be an alphanumeric literal; its value must be a valid program name, as described in 1.

3. The program address identifier may not be used as a receiving item.

General rule

A program address identifier creates a specific elementary item of the class “pointer” and the category “program pointer” that contains the address of an entry point of the program. The name of the entry point is contained in identifier-1 or literal-1.
If an error occurs during processing of the program address identifier, the program is aborted with a runtime error message.