Xref: utzoo comp.lang.c:14770 comp.std.c:564
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.std.c
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Definition of isprint()
Message-ID: <1988Dec15.180512.1854@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <474@sdrc.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 15 Dec 88 18:05:12 GMT

In article <474@sdrc.UUCP> scjones@sdrc.UUCP (Larry Jones) writes:
>We're using SAS C on an IBM mainframe and just ran into an
>interesting problem.  SAS has defined "printing character" in
>terms of what is printable on an ancient line printer so some
>obviously printable characters such as "{", "}", "[", "]", "\",
>and "!" cause isprint() to return 0!

One should remember that on an IBM system speaking EBCDIC, there *is*
no firm definition of which characters print and which don't, or what
they print as when they print, because there *is* no single character
code named "EBCDIC".  EBCDIC is a large family of different, often
incompatible, character codes.  Some EBCDICs, e.g. the one on the IBM
360/370 summary card (at least, on my old copy of it), do not have some
of those characters at all.  "!" seems a curious omission, but the
location and presence of the other characters you mention are highly
variable in EBCDIC.
-- 
"God willing, we will return." |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
-Eugene Cernan, the Moon, 1972 | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu