DISPLAY phrase

Syntax rules

1. The type of elementary item for which the DISPLAY phrase is written is defined by the character-string in the PICTURE clause.

General rules

1. The DISPLAY phrase specifies that the data item is to be stored in EBCDIC data format; that is, each character position is represented by one byte.

2. External decimal data items are internally represented as follows:

   Each digit of a number is represented by a single byte. The four high-order bits of each byte are the zone portion. The zone portion of the low-order or high-order byte (depending on the SIGN clause) represents the sign of the number, assuming that a sign exists. The four low-order bits contain the value of the digit.

   The maximum length of an external decimal item is 31 digits.

3. External floating-point items consist of a mantissa, which represents the decimal part of the number, and an exponent with the base 10
   

   The value of an external floating-point item is calculated by multiplying the mantissa by 10 to the power of exponent.
   The magnitude of a number represented by a floating-point item must be greater than 5.4 * 10^-79 and must not exceed 7.2 * 10⁷⁹ and must not exceed 7.2 * 10⁷⁵.

   An external floating-point item, when used as a numeric operand, is checked at object time and is converted into an internal floating-point item. It is used in this form in arithmetic operations (see notes on COMPUTATIONAL-1 and COMPUTATIONAL-2).

Example 7-30

Data formats for USAGE IS DISPLAY

Data category

Value

PICTURE description

Internal representation*)

alphabetic

ABCD

AAAA

C1

C2

C3

C4

alphanumeric

A1B2

XXXX

C1

F1

C2

F2

alphanumeric edited

123AB

XXBXXX

F1

F2

40

F3

C1

C2

numeric edited

54321

99,999

F5

F4

6B

F3

F2

F1

numeric external decimal external floating-point

+1234

9999

F1

F2

F3

F4

+6879

S9999

F6

F8

F7

C9

-6879

S9999

F6

F8

F7

D9

6879

+99.99E-99

4E

F6

F8

4B

F7

F9

C5

40

F0

F2

.6879

+99.99E-99

4E

F6

F8

4B

F7

F9

C5

60

F0

F2

^*) Each box represents one byte.