I've encountered a most annoying problem, that being the inability to store constants in DATA statements and read back the numeric values they represent. I understand this is because any non-numeric DATA statement "value", quoted or unquoted, is interpreted as a string. I would like to suggest that this be remedied in the next PB/DOS by either;
* Creating an EVAL or similar function to enable evaluation of a string, which in this case could be used to return the numeric value a constant name represents, or
* Altering the function of the READ statement so that non-numeric "values" are checked to determine if their first character is a % (or $ for string constants
) sign and if so, the "value" can be interpreted as a constant and the value the constant represents be returned instead of the name of the constant (as a string)
Come to think of it, an EVAL-type function would be useful in many other situations - please ensure that it is put on "the list" for consideration.
* Creating an EVAL or similar function to enable evaluation of a string, which in this case could be used to return the numeric value a constant name represents, or
* Altering the function of the READ statement so that non-numeric "values" are checked to determine if their first character is a % (or $ for string constants

Come to think of it, an EVAL-type function would be useful in many other situations - please ensure that it is put on "the list" for consideration.

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