A Bevy of BIFs: %XLATE and %REPLACE
by Jon Paris

The %XLATE and %REPLACE text replacement built-in functions (BIFs) are often confused, and part of that confusion may be the result of wishful thinking on the part of RPGers frustrated with the limitations of %XLATE. Just as with the %SCAN and %CHECK BIFs that I discussed in an earlier tip, the major difference between %XLATE and %REPLACE is that %XLATE operates on individual characters and %REPLACE operates on strings. READ MORE >

Send Messages Unto Others
by Ted Holt

I'll never forget the guy who used to call my telephone with a cheery 'My computer won't compute!' whenever he had a problem. Ambiguous appeals for help annoy me to no end. The least a guy can do is give me something to go on; some information to give me a place to start to look for his problem. But in fairness to users, I often find that they don't have much information to give me because the programmer didn't make the program tell them anything. A crafty CL programmer knows how to easily avoid such situations. READ MORE >