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$ZWASCII

Converts a two-byte string to a number.

Synopsis

$ZWASCII(string,position)
$ZWA(string,position)

Parameters

Argument Description
string A string. It can be a value, a variable, or an expression. It must be a minimum of two bytes in length.
position Optional — A starting position in the string, expressed as a positive integer. The default is 1. Position is counted in single bytes, not two-byte strings. The position cannot be the last byte in the string, or beyond the end of the string. A numeric position value is parsed as an integer by truncating decimal digits, removing leading zeros and plus signs, etc.

Description

The value that $ZWASCII returns depends on the parameters you use.

  • $ZWASCII(string) returns a numeric interpretation of a two-byte string starting at the first character position of string.

  • $ZWASCII(string,position) returns a numeric interpretation of a two-byte string beginning at the starting byte position specified by position.

Upon successful completion, $ZWASCII always returns a positive integer. $ZWASCII returns -1 if string is of an invalid length, or position is an invalid value.

Example

The following example determines the numeric interpretation of the character string "ab":

  WRITE $ZWASCII("ab")

It returns 25185.

The following examples also return 25185:

  WRITE !,$ZWASCII("ab",1)
  WRITE !,$ZWASCII("abxx",1)
  WRITE !,$ZWASCII("xxabxx",3)

In the following examples, string or position are invalid. The $ZWASCII function returns –1 in each case:

  WRITE !,$ZWASCII("a")
  WRITE !,$ZWASCII("aba",3)
  WRITE !,$ZWASCII("ababab",99)
  WRITE !,$ZWASCII("ababab",0)
  WRITE !,$ZWASCII("ababab",-1)

Notes

$ZWASCII and $ASCII

$ZWASCII is similar to $ASCII except that it operates on two byte (16-bit) words instead of single 8-bit bytes. For four byte (32-bit) words, use $ZLASCII; For eight byte (64-bit) words, use $ZQASCII.

$ZWASCII(string,position) is the functional equivalent of:

$ASCII(string,position+1)*256+$ASCII(string,position)

$ZWASCII and $ZWCHAR

The $ZWCHAR function is the logical inverse of $ZWASCII. For example:

   WRITE $ZWASCII("ab")

returns: 25185.

   WRITE $ZWCHAR(25185)

returns “ab”.

See Also

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