Each statement is either empty or contains several tokens. A statement can
consist
of several lines of text. If you wish a statement to be continued on the next
line simply end the line with a ``\'' character (or a dash (``--'')
with a blank space preceding it). The statement can only be broken
between tokens, never in the middle of a word or number. The number of
characters on a statement cannot total more than 1024. This limit is
usually not a problem, but like any limit in TNT can be increased if
need be.
If the ``#'' character is encountered (or ``!'' for VMS people) the rest of the line is presumed to be a comment. If the last letter prior to the beginning of the comment was a dash then the statement will be continued on the next line. One may have a statement spread over many lines, with a comment at the end of each.
A token is a collection of any characters other than spaces, tabs, commas, or control characters. Tokens can be empty, such as a comma with a blank before it or at the end of statement. An empty token usually denotes that a default value is to be used for that piece of information.
Tokens can contain either character or numeric data. Numbers may be entered in any format (including ``E'' format). Decimal points are not required when the value of the number is integral. When the token contains character data all letters will be capitalized before the data is interpreted (except for file names). This means that ``ca'' will be treated the same as ``CA''.
While all the characters of a token containing a number are important, only the beginning of a text token is saved. For some tokens only the first four letters are saved, others the first eight. With file names the first 128 letters are saved. Whether a particular token is significant to four or eight letters depends on the data type of the information which is being specified.
All statements begin with a keyword which specifies the type of the statement. The first 8 letters of a keyword are significant. There are two classes of keywords: data keywords and command keywords. Data keywords begin statements that contain information while command keywords specify actions that the program should take before any more statements are read. Many data keywords are common to all programs.