I recently spent 20-30 minutes tracking down the source of an error condition caused by an ill-formed number. The error reported during load began with '[-726]', and named the offending verb, but did not display the line (or even just the "number").
The verb contained only about half that number of lines. The script had a few more than 700, so scrolled back from its end about that far, to an area in the offending verb, but did not easily spot the error. I copied the verb definition to a separate file, and reloaded, getting the identical errror message. Only after two more splits did I get a small enough file to get the negative-line count close enough to the error to recognize it on careful reading My conclusion is that the error reports a count of statements, perhaps including empties, but also including controls such as do. and else. It is certainly useful to have some indicator of the error's location, but I find the current indicator difficult to use. --A number based on physical lines in the file would be more useful. --A number counted from the top would be more conventional. --A display of the offending character string would allow an immediate search for it, which should nearly always be a unique target. Thanks in advance to the team that considers an improvement in error reporting and--perhaps--chooses and manages to install one. --Art ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
