The SOR$BEGIN_SORT routine initializes the sort process by setting up sort work areas and provides key specification and sort options. Specify the key information with the key_buffer argument, with the user_compare argument, or in a specification file. If no key information is specified, the default (character for the entire record) is used. You must use the SOR$BEGIN_SORT routine to initialize the sort process for the file, record, and mixed interfaces. For record interface on input, you must use the lrl (longest record length) argument. Some of the following condition values are used with different severities, depending on whether SORT/MERGE can recover. Thus, if you want to check for a specific status, you should use LIB$MATCH_COND.