Form of General Directive Lines

General directives have the following syntax.

!DIR$ d1, d2, ...

A general directive line is defined as follows.

• A directive line starts with the 5 characters CDIR$ or !DIR$, followed by:

  • A space

  • A directive

• Spaces before, after, or within a directive are ignored.

• Letters of a directive line can be in uppercase, lowercase, or mixed.

The form varies for fixed-form and free-form source as follows.

Fixed-Form Source

• Put CDIR$ or !DIR$ in columns 1 through 5.

• Directives are listed in columns 7 and beyond.

• Columns beyond 72 are ignored.

• An initial directive line has a blank in column 6.

• A continuation directive line has a nonblank in column 6.

Free-Form Source

• Put !DIR$ followed by a space anywhere in the line. The !DIR$ characters are the first nonblank characters in the line (actually, non-whitespace).

• Directives are listed after the space.

• An initial directive line has a blank, tab, or newline in the position immediately after the !DIR$.

• A continuation directive line has a character other than a blank, tab, or newline in the position immediately after the !DIR$.

Thus, !DIR$ in columns 1 through 5 works for both free-form source and fixed-form source.