ML> Excerpted from a message dated 05-31-99, Jack Stein to David Noon:

 DN> The LINES() function returns an integer. You were simply
 DN> lucky that the implementation at that time always returned
 DN> an integer that was conformable to Boolean usage: 0 or 1.

JS>I still don't understand this as the docs state that the built in
  >function LINES always returns a 1 or a 0, so testing for that seems
  >OK, and works OK as well, both in CREXX and OREXX.  In OREXX, as a
  >method, it returns a 0 or the number of lines remaining, which also
  >should work as it is either 0 (false) or not 0, true.  It is
  >"supposed" to work this way for files or STDIN.

ML> Hi Jack--

ML>     The only language I am familiar with that will accept any nonzero
  > value as "true" in Boolean expressions is BASIC.  Most certainly, none


   Murray, obviously I'm reading this months after it was posted, 
   but for the record, Borland's pascal can be made (tricked?) to 
   treat integers as described.

                                       LRA


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