Re: DATFMT

I didn't realize that I could CHAIN to a file with a key in *JUL format,
while using an *ISO date data type field.

Thank you Hans for pointing this out, and thanks to all who 
responded.
Dave

----------
> From: Hans Boldt <boldt@ca.ibm.com>
> To: MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com
> Subject: Re: DATFMT
> Date: Friday, July 24, 1998 8:56 AM
> 
> Neil wrote:
> >Workaround:
> >
> >Hence avoid the INZ in the Data specification unless it coincides with
the
> >default date format you are using.  Looks like MDY for you.  Instead
move
> >the value in during your *INZSR.
> >
> >                MoveL    '91/164'         SURCH_DATE
> 
> And what happens if a programmer wants to change the format
> of SURCH_DATE?  Any MOVE and MOVEL statements will then have
> to be changed as well.  Use EVAL and the format is
> automatically converted for you.
> 
> I think the better question is:  Why is the program using a
> date format that does not have a 4 digit year?
> 
> As another poster stated, the current design is an example of
> "six of one, half a dozen of another".  But there are other
> good reasons for the current design.  Early on, we thought of
> having date operations in expressions.  If we did not force a
> consistent format for date literals, an expression like
> 
>             D'01/02/98' + *DAYS(1)
> 
> would be ambiguous.  Would the result be '02/02/98' or
> '01/03/98'?  Americans would expect one answer, Europeans the
> other.
> 
> Again, why use a 2-digit year date format?  Is it because the
> file you are searching in has a key in *JUL format?  No
> problem - if you code an *ISO format date field in F1 of CHAIN,
> the operation will still work.  For most uses of date fields
> in RPG, format conversions happen automatically.  So for most
> purposes, there are very few reasons for using anything other
> than the *ISO default.
> 
> Cheers!  Hans
> 
> Hans Boldt, ILE RPG Development, IBM Toronto Lab, boldt@ca.ibm.com
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