EXECPERIOD

Controls whether a period following END-EXEC is treated as part of that statement when there are separating spaces, lines or comments.

Restriction: The Integrated Preprocessor is supported for native COBOL only.

Syntax:

>>---EXECPERIOD"arg"---><

Parameters:

arg

arg must be one of:

INCLUDE: Always includes the period as part of the EXEC statement.
EXCLUDE: Always excludes the period from the EXEC statement.
SMART: Includes the period for EXECs in the DATA DIVISION. Excludes the period for EXECs in the PROCEDURE DIVISION.

Properties:

Default:

EXECPERIOD"SMART"

Comments:

Periods that immediately follow END-EXEC are always treated as part of the EXEC statement.

An example of when this directive is important is when a paragraph or section header follows the EXEC statement, as the header requires a preceding terminating period.