## 11.3.6 Slash Editing (/)

The slash edit descriptor terminates data transfer for the current record and starts data transfer for a new record. It takes the following form:

  [r]/

The r is a repeat specification. It must be a positive default integer literal constant; no kind parameter can be specified.

The range of r is 1 through 2147483647 (2**31-1) on Alpha and ia64 processors; 1 through 32767 (2**15-1) on ia32 processors. If r is omitted, it is assumed to be 1.

Multiple slashes cause the system to skip input records or to output blank records, as follows:

- When n consecutive slashes appear between two edit descriptors, n - 1 records are skipped on input, or n - 1 blank records are output. The first slash terminates the current record. The second slash terminates the first skipped or blank record, and so on.
- When n consecutive slashes appear at the beginning or end of a format specification, n records are skipped or n blank records are output, because the opening and closing parentheses of the format specification are themselves a record initiator and terminator, respectively. For example, suppose the following statements are specified:

           WRITE (6,99)
      99   FORMAT ('1',T51,'HEADING LINE'//T51,'SUBHEADING LINE'//)

  The following lines are written:

                        Column 50, top of page
                        |
                        HEADING LINE
      (blank line)
                        SUBHEADING LINE
      (blank line)
      (blank line)

  Note that the first character of the record printed was reserved as a control character (see Section 11.7).

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