Translator – PRINT Command

It is necessary to look at how PRINT statements will be executed to determine how they need to be encoded and thus translated. But first, here is the general syntax of the PRINT statement:

PRINT [<expression>][;|, [<expression>]...]

Zero or more expressions may be included. The expressions can result with a double, integer or string value. Numbers are output with a trailing space. The expression may be one of print only functions SPC and TAB, both taking an integer expression. After the expressions are output, the PRINT will move to a new line unless the line ends with a semicolon, comma, SPC or TAB. (More options will be added later like PRINT USING and PRINT to a file.)

The SPC function outputs the number of spaces of the integer expression (less than 1 outputs no spaces). The TAB function advances the cursor to the column of the integer expression, where the first column is defined as column 1 (less than 1 is taken as column 1). If the cursor is already beyond the column specified, then PRINT goes to the next line, and then to the specified column. Using TAB(1) in the middle of a PRINT statement has the effect of doing a new line (an '\n' in C).

A semicolon is used to separate expressions, but does not affect what is output. The syntax above implies multiple semicolons may be entered. This is allowed, but will cause dummy semicolon tokens to be inserted into the code. A comma advances to the next column. A column will initially be defined as one-fifth of the screen width (at 80 columns, this is 5 columns of 16 characters). Eventually there will be a way for this width to be defined to any value.