John Clark (writing as Lazlo Toth (?)) wrote:
> >  X = -X
> 
> Yeah, this seemed to be a good idea at the time but I couldn't get the 
> compiler to recognise it. 
> 
> Similarly, it wouldn't look at this
> 
> LONG IF ArcCheck% = - 2
> 
> unless it was written like
> 
> LONG IF ArcCheck% = (-2)
> 
> So perhapse if I had removed the odd space, X = -X would have worked 
> fine. I think I had a hit at something like  Al Staffieri Jr. suggested: 
> X = X - (X * 2) , but my conscience got the better of me :-)

Yes, this seems to be a peculiarity of the compiler that I hadn't known
about before.  When I try it, I notice that the compiler does _not_ like
a space between the unary minus sign and a literal constant.  However a
space _is_ apparently acceptable between the unary minus and any other
kind of expression element (like a variable, a symbolic constant, etc.) 
An unsightly feature, but not deadly.

- Rick