Fortran Coding Form Pads...

From: Hans B Pufal <hansp_at_aconit.org>
Date: Wed Jul 31 11:18:00 2002

Nick Gessler wrote:
> Although IBM cards were 80 columns wide, the last eight columns were
> reserved for a sequence number in case the deck was dropped. The deck
> could then be put back in order with a card sorter. That left 72
> columns for code and/or data...

The last 8 colums were only used for sequence numbers by convention and
then normally only for program source code, a use of cards which came
very late in their history. They were not reserved and many applications
used all 80 columns for data.

  -- hbp
Received on Wed Jul 31 2002 - 11:18:00 BST