DBCS notation

Double-Byte Character Set (DBCS) strings in literals, comments, and user-defined words are delimited by shift-out and shift-in characters.

In this document, the shift-out delimiter is represented pictorially by the < character, and the shift-in character is represented pictorially by the > character. The single-byte EBCDIC codes for the shift-out and shift-in delimiters are X'0E' and X'0F', respectively.

The <> symbol denotes contiguous shift-out and shift-in characters. The >< symbol denotes contiguous shift-in and shift-out characters.

DBCS characters are shown in this form: D1D2D3. Latin alphabet characters in DBCS representation are shown in this form: .A.B.C. The dots that precede the letters represent the hexadecimal value X'42'.

Notes:

In EBCDIC DBCS data containing mixed single-byte and double-byte characters, double-byte character strings are delimited by shift-out and shift-in characters.
In ASCII DBCS data containing mixed single-byte and double-byte characters, double-byte character strings are not delimited by shift-out and shift-in characters.