A user may specify a decimal separator to use for numbers on his or her system. The decimal separator chosen usually conforms to the decimal separator in use in their region of the world. A comma (,) or period (.) are common. Windows allows other characters such as an apostrophe ('), space, or any other punctuation. A user sets the decimal separator by using the Regional and Language Options in the Microsoft Windows Control Panel.

ESL supports this user-specified decimal separator in entry fields that have been defined with floatonly validation and in float columns within tables. ESL supports it for user entry, display, and, within entry fields, for validation. A user may type the user-specified character as the decimal separator. When ESL displays text in the floatonly entry field or float column (from the object's definition or via a change text to statement), it displays the user-specified character as the decimal point, replacing any period from the text. When ESL validates the floatonly entry field, it recognizes the user-specified decimal separator.

Within a floatonly entry field, a period is also always available for use as the decimal separator for compatibility with previous versions of ESL.

The user-specified decimal separator is not supported by other parts of ESL. Other parts of ESL continue to recognize the period as the decimal separator; for example, the copy and extract statements do not support the user-specified decimal separator. Thus, when the text of statement queries the value of the floatonly entry field or the float column, the user-defined decimal separator is replaced with a period in the returned text. The interface to the rest of the ESL program is maintained.