RE: Minus Key sends different something to 400

I'm going to have to touch up on my EBCDIC hehe. actually I'm just a network
admin that gets tied into trying to decipher all this qpgmr stuff. I can
vary a device on and off and kill a program beyond that I'm useless. ;-)

I semi figured this out (I didn't realize what or why) but I found that it
was really working it just looked wrong.

Thanks guys.
Matt

-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Bale [mailto:dbale@samsa.com]
Sent: Thursday, August 01, 2002 10:26 AM
To: linux5250@midrange.com
Subject: RE: [LINUX5250] Minus Key sends different something to 400


Matt, in addition to Scott's reply, and seeing that you're new to the
AS/400, it might be helpful to know what that '}' character you're seeing
is.  A little tutorial on EBCDIC and signs might clear some of this up for
you.

The digits 0 thru 9 are represented by EBCDIC values x'F0' through x'F9'.
On the AS/400, this is true when the digits are being used as numeric or
alpha.  When a number's sign is changed to negative, the first half-byte of
the least significant (rightmost) digit is changed from F to D.  Therefore,
negative numbers 0 through 9 are represented by EBCDIC values x'D0' through
x'D9'.  (IIRC, ASCII numeric values in storage that are negative are simply
prefaced with a '-' character.  Not so with EBCDIC.)  In alphanumeric mode,
the EBCDIC values x'D0' through x'D9' represent the characters '}', 'J',
'K', ... 'R', respectively.

Therefore, the '}' you are seeing represents a zero with a negative sign.
If you entered '500' and pressed the Field Minus key, the value in the
system would be '50}' (or x'F5F0D0').  If the entry field in the display
file is defined correctly, the value would display as '500-' (the placement
of the sign is, again, determined by an edit code defined to the entry
field).

It looks to me that someone on the AS/400 side needs to modify the display
file.  Usually, using the default "Signed" keyboard shift allows the easiest
handling of negative numbers.  Unfortunately, you cannot key decimal points
in an entry field defined as such.  Since your user likely is keying dollar
amounts with a decimal point, the keyboard shift for this field cannot be
"Signed".  I don't have an example handy, but some other combination of
keyboard shift and edit codes should take care of this.

- Dan Bale
(I am *NOT* "Dale"
http://archive.midrange.com/midrange-l/200105/msg00281.html )

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