this must be a stupid question ...

[Ben Finney]

Stef Mientki <S.Mientki-nospam at mailbox.kun.nl> writes:

> but I can;t find the answer ;-)

It's not a stupid question, but it is a stupid Subject field. That's
easy to fix though: in future, please write a Subject field that
actually tells us what the message is about.

> If I try to use [the $ symbol] in names, I get a compiler error,

Yes, because names have a specific set of characters that must be
used: A-Z, a-z, 0-9, and the underscore.

> so it probably has some special meaning.

That doesn't follow; it just means that character isn't allowed for
names. This does have the advantage that, if necessary, it can be used
in future (the '@' symbol was recently added to the language, though
it didn't have a meaning before).

-- 
 \      "The future always arrives too fast, and in the wrong order."  |
  `\                                                  -- Alvin Toffler |
_o__)                                                                  |
Ben Finney