Designing the Procedure Logic › Handle Repeating Groups › Implicit Subscripting

Implicit Subscripting

If a repeating group view is implicitly subscripted, CA Gen keeps track of position within the group view, so that no logic is needed to do this explicitly.

For example, when the FOR EACH action is used, the CA Gen-generated procedure automatically jumps to the next occurrence of the subject repeating group view of the FOR EACH after each iteration.

When the TARGETING clause is used, the generate procedure automatically jumps to the next occurrence of the targeted repeating group view after each iteration (if the current occurrence is modified).

The following constructs support implicit subscripting and apply only to implicitly subscripted repeating group views:

• FOR EACH
• Targeting clause on the actions:
  • FOR EACH
  • READ EACH
  • WHILE
  • REPEAT
• Condition is:
  • FULL
  • NOT FULL
  • EMPTY
  • NOT EMPTY

In most cases, implicit subscripting is sufficient for the handling of repeating group views, particularly during analysis.

However, some cases exist where the processing requirement for repeating group views exceeds the capabilities of implicit subscripting. For example, it is impossible to iterate through two different repeating group views simultaneously using this technique. Likewise, the procedure logic cannot reverse direction or select arbitrary occurrences from the group. In cases where such processing is required, explicit subscripting is helpful.