Hi Moskovitz,

1.
I think, there is no improvement done during the last 10 years.

2.
Its a syntax rule. You must accept it, or write your own assembler with different syntax rules.
Or use a macro:

mylabel macro arg0
arg0&:
endm

mylabel xx
nop
jmp xx

3.
There is an explanation in the asm51.doc


Peter