In the realm of COBOL programming, managing currency symbols is crucial for applications dealing with financial transactions or monetary values. A currency symbol represents a specific currency sign value, which is used to denote the monetary unit within data items. This symbol is inserted when data is received and removed when data is sent for numeric or numeric-edited receivers. Common examples of currency sign values include ‘$’, ‘EUR’, ‘CHF’, ‘JPY’, ‘HK$’, ‘HKD’, and even hexadecimal representations like X’9F’ for the Euro Currency Sign (€) in certain EBCDIC code pages.
The CURRENCY SIGN clause in COBOL is specifically designed to allow programmers to define a currency sign value and a corresponding currency symbol that will be used within PICTURE clauses. This is particularly relevant when working with currencies like the Euro, where the standard dollar sign might not be appropriate.
Within the SPECIAL-NAMES paragraph, you can define one or more CURRENCY SIGN clauses, each specifying a unique currency symbol. It’s important to note that currency symbols in COBOL are case-sensitive; for instance, ‘D’ and ‘d’ would represent distinct symbols.
Let’s delve into the syntax of the CURRENCY SIGN clause:
CURRENCY SIGN IS literal-6 [PICTURE SYMBOL literal-7]Here, literal-6 is an alphanumeric literal that defines the currency sign value. If the PICTURE SYMBOL phrase is omitted, literal-6 serves both as the currency sign value and the currency symbol. In this simplified form, literal-6 must be a single character and cannot be any digit from 0 to 9, or specific uppercase and lowercase alphabetic characters (A, B, C, D, E, G, N, P, R, S, U, V, X, Z and their lowercase equivalents), or the space, or special characters like + – , . * / ; ( ) " = '. However, it can be one of the lowercase alphabetic characters: f, h, i, j, k, l, m, o, q, t, w, y.
When the PICTURE SYMBOL phrase is included, literal-6 solely defines the currency sign value, which can be a single character or a multi-character literal. It must not contain digits 0 through 9 or special characters + – . ,. The PICTURE SYMBOL literal-7 then specifies the currency symbol that will represent the currency sign value from literal-6 in PICTURE clauses. literal-7 must be a single-byte alphanumeric literal and cannot be a figurative constant, digits 0 through 9, specific uppercase and lowercase alphabetic characters (A, B, C, D, E, G, N, P, R, S, U, V, X, Z and their lowercase equivalents), the space, or special characters + – , . * / ; ( ) " = '.
For example, to specifically use ‘€’ as the Euro currency sign, you might use a hexadecimal representation if your character set requires it, or directly if your environment supports it. Let’s assume you want to define ‘EUR’ as the currency sign value and ‘E’ as the currency symbol for Euro. You could configure the CURRENCY SIGN clause like this:
SPECIAL-NAMES.
CURRENCY SIGN IS "EUR" PICTURE SYMBOL "E".After this declaration, you can use ‘E’ in your PICTURE clauses to represent the Euro currency symbol. For instance, you could define a data item as:
01 EURO-AMOUNT PIC $E,999,999.99.In this PICTURE clause, ‘$’ represents the standard currency symbol (dollar by default if not redefined), and ‘E’ now represents the Euro symbol as defined. It’s important to note that the placement and usage within PICTURE clauses follow COBOL syntax rules for currency symbols.
It’s also worth mentioning the interaction with compiler options. If a CURRENCY SIGN clause is specified in your COBOL program, compiler options CURRENCY and NOCURRENCY are ignored. If no CURRENCY SIGN clause is present and the NOCURRENCY compiler option is in effect, the dollar sign ($) is used as both the default currency sign value and currency symbol.
In conclusion, the CURRENCY SIGN clause offers essential flexibility in COBOL for handling various currency symbols, including the Euro currency sign. By correctly utilizing this clause within the SPECIAL-NAMES paragraph, programmers can ensure their COBOL applications accurately represent and process financial data across different currencies. For more in-depth programming techniques related to handling currency signs, especially the Euro, refer to the Enterprise COBOL Programming Guide.
