User guide > Logic > Relational tests

Relational tests compare the values of two variables, using one of the six relational operators:

.EQ. equal to

.GT. greater than

.LT. less than

.NE. not equal to

.LE. less than or equal to

.GE. greater than or equal or

The following relational tests are allowed (where relop is one of the above):

col.relop.col code comparison (only .EQ. and .NE. allowed)

col.relop.cvar character comparison

col.relop.literal character comparison

field.relop.field code comparison (only .EQ. and .NE. allowed)

field.relop.svar numeric comparison

field.relop.ivar numeric comparison

field.relop.wvar numeric comparison

field.relop.cvar character comparison

field.relop.cell numeric comparison

field.relop.literal character comparison

field.relop.iconstant numeric comparison

svar.relop.svar numeric comparison

svar.relop.field numeric comparison

svar.relop.ivar numeric comparison

svar.relop.wvar numeric comparison

svar.relop.cell numeric comparison

svar.relop.bit numeric comparison

ivar.relop.svar numeric comparison

ivar.relop.field numeric comparison

ivar.relop.ivar numeric comparison

ivar.relop.wvar numeric comparison

ivar.relop.cell numeric comparison

ivar.relop.iconstant numeric comparison

wvar.relop.svar numeric comparison

wvar.relop.field numeric comparison

wvar.relop.ivar numeric comparison

wvar.relop.wvar numeric comparison

wvar.relop.cell numeric comparison

wvar.relop.wconstant numeric comparison

cvar.relop.col character comparison

cvar.relop.field character comparison

cvar.relop.cvar character comparison

cvar.relop.literal character comparison

cell.relop.svar numeric comparison

cell.relop.field numeric comparison

cell.relop.ivar numeric comparison

cell.relop.wvar numeric comparison

cell.relop.cell numeric comparison

cell.relop.wconstant numeric comparison

mvar.relop.mvar bit comparison (only .EQ. and NE. allowed)

In field.relop. the field is treated as an ivar if it is less than 10 columns wide, otherwise it is treated as a wvar.

The entities in character comparisons must be of equal length.

Relational operators LT, GT, LE and GE when used in character comparisons use system functions to compare according to the ASCII collating sequence in use on the computer.

IMPORTANT: U (undefined) is in fact a very large negative number.

Only relational operators EQ and NE are allowed in code comparisons and mvar comparisons. Variables are equal if the same bits (and only those bits) are set in both variables. For mvars only the variables may be different lengths but they will only be equal if all the additional bits are empty.

NOTE: an svar with no bits set is treated as having a value of zero.

Examples of relational tests:

$123.ne.$124,

$1245.eq.'A',

$123-125.ge.20,

$9171-9173.ne.'MRS',

$s1.gt.$s2,

$m1.ne.$m2,

$i1.eq.$i2,

$wtest.le.15.5,

$cp1.eq.'T1',

#23(r0,c0).gt.0.0,