RE: Record with external defaults (DeLong, Eric)

I don't think you can say that OS400 handles NULL values any differently
than any other platform (RDBMS?).

AFAIK, most use the same scheme, a NULL indicator array.  

That is after all, the only reasonable way to handle it.

RPG on the other hand could work a bit better.  %NULLIND itself is not the
problem, as I don't see much different between:

field1 is null
        and
%NULLIND(field1)

But I think NULL support for internal variables might be useful.  Instead of
just supporting NULL for external database fields.

Interestingly, NULL pointers are basically supported via the *OMIT option.


Charles


> -----Original Message-----
> From: DeLong, Eric [mailto:EDeLong@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
> Sent: Friday, September 03, 2004 11:25 AM
> To: 'RPG programming on the AS400 / iSeries'
> Subject: RE: Record with external defaults (DeLong, Eric)
> 
> 
> Yes, that's correct....  At issue however was a 
> misunderstanding of how null
> fields work in RPG.  The null indicator is just a field 
> attribute that tells
> you (the programmer) to not use the returned data.  The 
> contents of the
> field must still be a valid date value, even though the null 
> flag is set.
> Other platforms handle nulllable fields differently, and this 
> makes OS400's
> implementation of null value support a bit harder to grasp.  
> 
> 
> Eric DeLong
> Sally Beauty Company
> MIS-Project Manager (BSG)
> 940-898-7863 or ext. 1863