FastSort Manual

Using FastSort Commands
FastSort Manual—429834-003
3-7
COLLATE Command
ranges, and comments preceded by exclamation points. The following rules apply to
specifying ranges in the file:

All the ranges together must include character assignments for exactly 256 byte
positions. You can assign more than one character to the same position. You can
also assign the same character to more than one position.

The number of lines in the file is irrelevant, but you cannot put a range of
characters on more than one line.

If the file has more than one range, commas must separate the ranges.
Assignment of Characters to Byte Positions
In a range that assigns characters to byte positions, you can use any of the following.

Alphanumeric characters, enclosed in quotation marks

Decimal or octal numeric literals

The THRU keyword to abbreviate the specification of a range

The ALSO keyword to assign more than one character to a position, which makes
the characters equivalent in comparisons
A range cannot include both alphanumeric characters and numeric literals.
Alphanumeric Character Assignments
You must enclose alphanumeric character assignments in quotation marks. To include
a quotation mark in a character range, use two consecutive quotation marks:
"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ""+*%",
Numeric Literal Character Assignments
The octal numeric literals include %0 to %377, and the decimal numeric literals include
0 through 255. You can combine both in a range:
%10 THRU 55,
Abbreviated and Equivalent Character Assignments
THRU abbreviates the specification of a range of characters. You must use commas to
separate a range that includes THRU from other ranges:
"A" THRU "Z", 65 THRU 90,
ALSO assigns more than one character to the same character position in the collating
sequence. You must use commas to separate a range that includes ALSO from other
ranges:
"A", ALSO "a", "B", ALSO "b",