gfortran silently trunkates lines which gives syntax errors. Especially in free format, the truncation is usually not intended. (In fixed format is sometimes is.)
Other compiles print a warning (such as g95, all options; syntax error afterwards), give an error (such as NAG f95) or (silently) accept longer lines (ifort, all options). gfortran prints a warning, but only with -Wall not with -pedantic -std=f95. Real-world example: http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/fortran/2007-05/msg00042.html Message: "," name=",1H",A,1H",">",A,"</i>")',ADVANCE="Yes") blank(1:inden),tag,str(1 1 Error: Syntax error in argument list at (1) -- Summary: Better message than "syntax error" when truncating long lines Product: gcc Version: 4.3.0 Status: UNCONFIRMED Keywords: diagnostic Severity: normal Priority: P3 Component: fortran AssignedTo: unassigned at gcc dot gnu dot org ReportedBy: burnus at gcc dot gnu dot org http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=31812
