RE: Use of %DEC with unformatted character numerics

 >> Then whats the point in specifying digits and precision?

Because that's how you tell the compiler how you want to format the result.
This function is really to handle web/xml/whatever interactions where the
user may have simply entered 123 or 123.0 or 123.00 or ..... and you need it
with two decimal places.

The notion of using this to convert parms passed as character strings (and I
will indeed hold my tongue over that one) is hardly likely to have figure in
the compiler writers minds.  After all they do give the option of passing
packed or zoned fields (OK - so one _tiny_ mention <grin>)

Jon Paris
Partner400
www.Partner400.com