Symbol table
When the assembler processes your source statements for the first
time, it assigns an absolute or relocatable value to every symbol
that appears in the name field of an instruction. The assembler enters
this value, which normally reflects the setting of the location counter,
into the symbol table. It also enters the attributes associated with
the data represented by the symbol. The values of the symbol and its
attributes are available later when the assembler finds this symbol
or attribute reference used as a term in an operand or expression.
See
Symbol length attribute referenceand
Self-defining termsin this chapter for more details. The three types of symbols recognized by the assembler are:
- Ordinary symbols
- Variable symbols
- Sequence symbols