Changing the point of view in COBOL

The point of view is usually the currently executing block. You can also get to inaccessible data by changing the point of view using the SET QUALIFY command. The SET keyword is optional. For example, if the point of view (current execution) is in main and you want to issue several commands using variables declared in subprog, you can change the point of view by issuing the following:

QUALIFY BLOCK subprog;

You can then issue commands using the variables declared in subprog without using qualifiers. z/OS® Debugger does not see the variables declared in procedure main. For example, the following assignment commands are valid with the subprog point of view:

MOVE 10 TO var5;

However, if you want to display the value of a variable in main while the point of view is still in subprog, you must use a qualifier, as shown in the following example:

LIST (main:>var-name);