Richard, I understand your disappointment. HLASM is a bit picky in that it will use lookahead in many cases, but not all.
This is one of those examples. I got into the habit of defining DSECTs, constants and the like at the top, rather than at the bottom of my pgm. By default neatly wrapped in PRINT OFF/ON to keep the listing clean of clutter. Some of my code relies heavily on inheritance. For some attributes I ran into comparable issues. I cannot speak on behalf of the team, but my guess is that fixing this issue might potentially break someone else's code. Kind regards, Abe === On 05/08/2026 16:22, Richard Zierdt wrote: > This assembles w/o error: > LENGTH EQU 12 > MVC APPLES,=CL(LENGTH)' ' > APPLES DS CL16 > > This fails: > MVC APPLES,=CL(LENGTH2)' ' > LENGTH2 EQU 12 > APPLES DS CL16 > > with this message: > ASMA151E Literal expression modifiers must be absolute and predefined - > =CL(LENGTH2)' ' > > > Dear PGM=ASMA90, could I ask you to look ahead, just a bit, to find an (as > yet) undefined symbol ? You looked ahead for APPLES, so why not LENGTH2? > And when you tell me why you can't, might I ask you to overcome that obstacle > to help your customers produce the most concise and clear programs possible? > We're all in this together. > > Best regards, > Richard Zierdt > > Confidentiality Warning/Avertissement de confidentialité: > > This message is intended only for the named recipients. This message may > contain information that is privileged or confidential. If you are not the > named recipient, its employee or its agent, please notify us immediately and > permanently destroy this message and any copies you may have. Ce message est > destiné uniquement aux destinataires dûment nommés. Il peut contenir de > l'information privilégiée ou confidentielle. Si vous n'êtes pas le > destinataire dûment nommé, son employé ou son mandataire, veuillez nous > aviser sans tarder et supprimer ce message ainsi que toute copie qui peut en > avoir été faite. > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, > send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
