Commodore Plus 4 - Page 81

BASIC Version 3.5 Commands, Functions, and System Variables 69
• Values of variables or functions
Each PRINT command can contain one or more of these types of data. You
can use commas or semicolons to separate multiple PRINT items and to deter
mine the format for output.
Parameters: "text message9'
variable
calculation
All the parameters are optional. If no parameter is included, the PRINT
command prints only a carriage return. In most cases this results in a blank line
being PRINTed, but if the previous PRINT command ended in a semicolon, a
following PRINT with no parameters just goes to the next line. See the later
paragraph on using semicolons.
1. All text must be enclosed in quotes. Text messages are printed exactly as
they are typed. Calculations and variables typed inside quotes are also printed as
they are; PRINT does not attempt to find solutions for them when they are in
quotes.
2. When you tell the computer to PRINT a variable, the computer actually
prints the value the variable stands for, not the variable name. If no value has
been assigned to a numeric variable, aO is printed; if no value has been assigned to
a text-string variable, nothing is printed. Positive numeric values are printed with
a leading blank space; negative numeric values display the minus sign in front of
the number.
3. When you tell the computer to PRINT a calculation, the computer actually
prints the solution to the calculation. If the calculation contains a variable for
which no value has been assigned, the computer considers the variable to have a
value of 0 and solves the calculation accordingly.
Punctuation in PRINT Commands
You can separate multiple PRINT command items with commas or semicolons.
If you want to link the output from more than one PRINT command, you can
add a comma or a semicolon to the end of the first PRINT command. This
trailing punctuation tells the computer to treat the output as if it were from one
PRINT command instead of several.
Commas Force separate items into separate output zones of 10 spaces
each. Each new item begins in a new output zone, regardless
of how much space the previous item takes.
Semicolons Print separate items right next to each other. Numbers are
printed with one space or a negative sign in front and one
space behind. If you do riot like this number format, see
PRINT USING or STR$ for other options.