Free-Format RPG: Structure, the **FREE Directive, and Spec Types

Every RPG source member is organized around a small set of specification types — control, file, definition, procedure, and calculation — that once lived in fixed columns. This lesson shows how fully free-form source replaces those columns with keyword-led statements, and what the **FREE…

What you'll be able to do

1. 1Explain the role of the **FREE directive and the rules for its placement, and distinguish fully free-form source from column-limited free-form source.
2. 2Map each fixed-format specification type — H, F, D, P, and C — to its free-form statement, and identify the I and O specifications as having no free-form equivalent.
3. 3Write correctly terminated free-form statements and comments, and apply consistent conventions for case, indentation, and multi-line statements.
4. 4Lay out a complete free-form source member in the order the compiler requires: control options, declarations, main calculations, and subprocedures.
5. 5Read a short fixed-format program and identify the free-form equivalent of each line.