LTRIM: PROC (INSTRING) RETURNS (CHAR (*) VARYING);

 /* LTRIM REMOVES PRECEDING BLANKS, IF ANY, FROM A CHARACTER
    STRING AND RETURNS THE NEW STRING.  IF INSTRING IS ALL BLANK, LTRIM
    RETURNS A NULL STRING.
    HEATHER SEID -- 2/2/82  */

 DCL (INSTRING) CHAR(*) VARYING;
 DCL OUTPTR PTR;
 DCL OUTSTRING CHAR (LENGTH(INSTRING)) VARYING BASED (OUTPTR);
 DCL POS FIXED BIN(31);
 DCL STOP BIT;
 DCL (SUBSTR,VERIFY) BUILTIN;

 ALLOCATE OUTSTRING;

 /* TRIM PRECEDING BLANKS */

 POS = VERIFY (INSTRING, ' ');
 IF POS = 0 THEN OUTSTRING = '';
    ELSE OUTSTRING = SUBSTR (INSTRING,POS);

 RETURN (OUTSTRING);

 END LTRIM;