Coding conditional expressions

Using the IF and EVALUATE statements, you can code program actions that will be performed depending on the truth value of a conditional expression.

You can specify the following conditions:

  • Relation conditions, such as:
    • Numeric comparisons
    • Alphanumeric comparisons
    • DBCS comparisons
    • National comparisons
  • Class conditions; for example, to test whether a data item:
    • IS NUMERIC
    • IS ALPHABETIC
    • IS ALPHABETIC-LOWER
    • IS ALPHABETIC-UPPER
    • IS DBCS
    • IS KANJI
  • Condition-name conditions, to test the value of a conditional variable that you define
  • Sign conditions, to test whether a numeric operand IS POSITIVE, NEGATIVE, or ZERO
  • Switch-status conditions, to test the status of UPSI switches that you name in the SPECIAL-NAMES paragraph
  • Complex conditions, such as:
    • Negated conditions; for example, NOT (A IS EQUAL TO B)
    • Combined conditions (conditions combined with logical operators AND or OR)

related concepts  
Switches and flags

related references  
General relation conditions (Enterprise COBOL for z/OS® Language Reference)  
Class condition (Enterprise COBOL for z/OS Language Reference)  
Rules for condition-name entries (Enterprise COBOL for z/OS Language Reference)  
Sign condition (Enterprise COBOL for z/OS Language Reference)  
Combined conditions (Enterprise COBOL for z/OS Language Reference)