6.3.2 Range Indicators

Optional range indicators (sometimes known as location indicators) can appear after the various markers in an ACATS test source file. These describe the exact range of the reported location of an expected error. Range indicators are usually used to expand the range of an error beyond the same line as the ERROR: or other marker.

The format of a range indicator is:

{[sl:]sp[;[el:]ep]}

In the above, '{' and '}' are literal, while '[' and ']' indicate optionality. Each of the four values is relative, so it is one or two digits, with an optional minus sign for el. Omitted values are assumed to be zero. Specifically:

sl

Start Line – offset before the current line for the start of the error range.

sp

Start Position – position offset in the line indicated by sl, relative to the start of the line.

el

End_Line – offset before the current line for the end of the error range. Can be negative if the end of the error range follows the error tag. But almost always should be zero.

ep

End Position – position offset from the last significant character in the line indication by End_Line. (The last significant character is the last non-white-space character not including any comment.)

This compact representation was chosen because of the limited space given the ACATS line length limit (see 4.5) and a desire to avoid unnecessarily cluttering tests with extraneous information.