Comments

A line comment is any sequence of characters that start with a double minus sign (--) to the end of the current input line. See the following examples:

-- This is a line comment.
-- Another line comment. Notice that it may contain unpaired ' and ".

The comment can contain sequences of double-byte characters that are enclosed between shift-out (SO, x'0E' in EBCDIC) and shift-in (SI, x'0F' in EBCDIC) characters. The line must end in a single-byte sequence to end the line comment. If the line ends in a double-byte sequence, the next line is interpreted as starting in the single-byte mode, which usually causes an error.

A block comment is any sequence of characters that start with slash asterisk (/*) to the nearest asterisk slash (*/). See the following example:

/* This is a block comment.
Notice that it can extend over several lines.
It can contain -- and unpaired ' or " */

The comment can contain sequences of double-byte characters that are enclosed between shift-out (SO, x'0E' in EBCDIC) and shift-in (SI, x'0F' in EBCDIC) characters. The asterisk and slash that end the comment are single-byte characters and is only recognized outside a double-byte sequence.