Real Old School Programming (was: Re: Where to buy a Selectric?)

[Andy Holt]

> Note one aspect of card-type programming that's largely a dim memory:
> Fixed-width fields.  That "C" for comment in FORTRAN goes in column 6, not
> 5, not 1, not 7.  Similarly, columns 73-80 are ignored by the compiler and
> 1-5 are reserved for statement labels.  Statements exclusive of the label,
> start between column 7 and 72.   A lot of languages, had more stringent
> placement requirements.
Nearly correct - C for comment went in column 1.
Column 6 was for continuation - anything other than a blank or zero in this
column appended the contents of columns 7-72 to the previous card image for
the compiler.
You were allowed 19 continuation cards in Fortran 4 tho' even a very complex
FORMAT statement rarely got that far.

Andy