Re: Weirdness in a zoned decimal field -- MIDRANGE-L

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James,
You and I have both figured out how to do it with weird methods. Methods
not normally occurring. We were also told how it could happen with data
migrated from a mainframe.

There is another possibility: data corruption.

One source of data corruption: Someone storing alphabetic characters in a
numeric field. Not uncommon with DDS defined fields and older
applications. For example, ERP package X has a zoned field for Zulu
currency translation. Well, we don't trade with Zulu's so we may overlay
that field with some character we perceive a need for.
Another: Data migration. Stored an invalid character, which just happens
to match a nibble that is a valid numeric.
Another: Data entry. Came from a web interface or whatever and someone
does a testn in rpg or some other test and what really wasn't meant to
pass as a numeric comes across as a numeric. For example, did you know
that a set of the capital letters, and a host of special characters, are
all valid numbers, if they are the right most digit in a zoned field?
Basically anything from x'y0' through x'y9' where y ranges from A-F. You
really need to think about how you validate numbers.

Rob Berendt

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