Reading a nonblank table row with a blank entry

[capmikee]

I thought this was possible, but I can’t figure it out from the documentation.

Can you choose a row in a table and then test whether one of the entries is blank without getting an error?

I got an error from this line:

if the style entry is a plurality style, reset the plurality style to the style entry;

P23 - Attempt to look up a non-existent entry in table
Most problems are detected when Inform translates the source text, but this is one of the exceptions, a “run-time problem” which emerges only during play.

Inform allows us to create tables with blank entries, having no value at all: sometimes these are written --, but sometimes they are literally left blank in the original source text. We are not allowed to read such an entry, and this is the problem which turns up if we do. (Whereas we are allowed to write to it, making it no longer blank if we do.)

[matt_weiner (matt w)]

Shouldn’t “If there is a style entry” work? That’s what WI 15.7 suggests.

[capmikee]

Weird, I could have sworn I tried that and it got a compilation error.