Summary of Coding Rules for Edit Words

The following rules apply to edit words in output specifications:

• Position 44 (edit codes) must be blank.
• Positions 30 through 43 (field name) must contain the name of a numeric field.
• An edit word must be enclosed in apostrophes, unless it is a named constant. Enter the leading apostrophe or begin a named constant name in position 53. The edit word itself must begin in position 54.

The following rules apply to edit words in general:

• The edit word can contain more digit positions (blanks plus the initial zero or asterisk) than the field to be edited, but must not contain less. If there are more digit positions in the edit word than there are digits in the field to be edited, leading zeros are added to the field before editing.
• If leading zeros from the source data are desired, the edit word must contain one more position than the field to be edited, and a zero must be placed in the high-order position of the edit word.
• In the body of the edit word only blanks and the zero-suppression stop characters (zero and asterisk) are counted as digit positions. The floating currency symbol is not counted as a digit position.
• When the floating currency symbol is used, the sum of the number of blanks and the zero-suppression stop character (digit positions) contained in the edit word must be equal to or greater than the number of positions in the field to be edited.
• Any zeros or asterisks following the leftmost zero or asterisk are treated as constants; they are not replaceable characters.
• When editing an unsigned integer field, DB and CR are allowed and will always print as blanks.