VERIFY

VERIFY returns an unscaled REAL FIXED BINARY value that indicates the position in x of the leftmost character, widechar, graphic, or bit that is not in y. It also allows you to specify the location within x at which to begin processing.

>>-VERIFY(x,y-+----+-)-----------------------------------------><
              '-,n-'     

x

String-expression.

y

String-expression.

n

Expression n specifies the location within x where processing begins. It must have a computational type and is converted to FIXED BINARY(31,0).

Unless 1 ≤ n ≤ LENGTH(x) + 1, the STRINGRANGE condition, if enabled, is raised. Its implicit action and normal return give a result of 0. If n = LENGTH(x) + 1, the result is zero.

The BIFPREC compiler option determines the precision of the result returned.

VERIFY will perform best when the second and third arguments are either literals, named constants declared with the VALUE attribute, or restricted expressions.

  X = '  a  b';         /* Two blanks in each space */
  Y = ' ';              /* One blank                */
  N = 1;
  I = verify(X,Y,N);    /* I = 3 */

  do while (I > 0);
    display ( 'Nonblank at position ' ∥ trim(I) );
    N = I + 1;
    I = verify(X,Y,N);
  end;