In Jun 14, 2012, at 10:02, Scott Ford wrote:
>
> ... he even used :
>
> label LR R11,R12 only any example...
>
> I got out of that habit long time ago because of program expandibility, not
> sure thats a word.
>
That, in turn, depends on which editor you're using.
With many modern editors, placing the label on a separate
line provides no advantage in "expandability".
On Jun 14, 2012, at 09:24, Frank Swarbrick wrote:
> Why funny? Seems to me that:
>
> EXIT LABEL
> RETURN (14,12),RC=0
>
>
> is a lot simpler to understand than
> EXIT DS 0H
> RETURN (14,12),RC=0
>
>
> Of course anyone who's programmed assembler for more than one day knows that
> the DS 0H is for, but I prefer to have my code describe "what it's for"
> rather than "how it works".
>
There's a principle of minimal information that has some value;
related to Occam's Razor. What's the minimal subset of the
Language Reference one could present to a novice in order that
he be able to write his first program. Adding one entity,
"LABEL", to the set contradicts that principle. "DS 0H"
has similar problems: the novice is apt to wonder, "Why are
you branching to a data area?"
> Personally, I think the assembler should support a feature where it would
> align properly if you specify a label followed by a colon. For example
>
> EXIT:
> RETURN (14,12),RC=0
You're taking a step in the direction of free-form input.
Long ago, I worked (minimally) with such an assembler,
in which the programmer might code something like the
above either as:
EXIT:
RETURN (14,12),RC=0
or as:
EXIT: RETURN (14,12),RC=0
or even:
EXIT: RETURN (14,12),RC=0
Indention had no significance; the ':' always signified
a label. (I make no judgment on stylistic merit.)
-- gil
