Example of condition names:

The illustration below is of the use of the condition names

 77  MARITAL-STATUS     PIC    9

  88  SINGLE    VALUE    IS     ZERO

  88  MARRIED    VALUE    IS    1.

  88  WIDOWED    VALUE    IS    2.

  88  DIVORCED    VALUE    IS    3.

  88  ONCE-MARRIED  VALUE  ARE    1, 2, 3.

  88  VALID-STATUS  VALUE  ARE    0 THRU 3.

It might be noted that 6 condition names have been defined here. All of them are related with the conditional variable MARITAL - STATUS. If at a point of time, the MARITAL STATUS gets the value of 2, then the condition names WIDOWED, ONCE-MARRIED & VALID-STATUS will become true and others will become false.

The condition names can be used as a condition. Therefore in PROCEDURE DIVISION we may have statements, such as:

(a)  IF SINGLE SUBTRACT 125 FROM DEDUCTIONS.

(b)  IF ONCE - MARRIED ADD 32 TO SPECIAL-PAY.

(c)  IF NOT VALID - STATUS GO TO ERROR - IN - STATUS.

In (a) statement SUBTRACT 125 FROM DEDUCTIONS will be executed if the MARITAL-STATUS is equivalent to zero. Likewise, in (b) the ADD statement will be executed only when the MARITAL - STATUS is equivalent to 1, 2 or 3 and in  (c) the control goes to the procedure ERROR-IN - STATUS only when MARITAL-STATUS has a value other than the 0, 1, 2 or 3. As in (c) a condition name can be preceding by NOT to point the negation of the condition.

The format for the condition - name condition is

  [NOT] condition - name

It is very important to note the usefulness of a condition name. Whenever a condition name specifies a single value for the conditional variable, the condition name is equal to the relational condition. For illustration, in (a) above the condition name SINGLE is equal to the relational condition MARITAL-STATUS =0. Even when the condition name identifies more than one value for the conditional variable, then condition name can be replaced by an equivalent compound condition. Therefore it may not be absolutely essential to make use of the condition names. However it may not be absolutely essential to make use of the condition names. The main benefit of a condition name is that it increases the readability of the statement which uses it. Surely, the use of the condition name WIDOWED conveys more information to a reader of the program than the use of the relational condition MARITAL-

STATUS =2. Specifically for this cause, it is suggested that whenever possible, the meaningful condition names must be used in a program.