The data you enter on the terminal should have exactly the same format as stream input data in batch mode, except for the following variations:
As an example, consider the following statement:
get list(I,J,K);
You could give the following response pressing the ENTER key after each item. (The colons only appear if you specify PROMPT(Y).
: 1 : 2 : 3
Entering the data on separate lines is equivalent to specifying:
: 1,2,3
If you wish to continue an item on another line, you must end the first line with a continuation character (the hyphen). Otherwise, for a GET LIST or GET DATA statement, a comma is inserted. For a GET EDIT statement, the item is padded.
Consider the following PL/I statement:
get edit(Name)(a(15));
You could enter these five characters followed immediately by the ENTER.
SMITH
The item is padded with 10 blanks, so that the program receives a string 15 characters long. If you wish to continue an item on a second or subsequent line, you must add a continuation character to the end of every line except the last. Otherwise, the first line transmitted would be padded and treated as the complete data item.