RE: Why does USER require VARCHAR and not work with CHAR?

An additional question is why folks are defining fixed length strings in any new database files.

I know in most modern programming languages doing string trims on all those CHAR fields is a major pain in the....

How often have you had to do a TRIM(FirstName) + TRIM(LastName) so that it shows up as "John Smith" instead of "John Smith "

It is for that reason I loath CHAR and NCHAR.

I sometimes wonder how many CPU cycles have been burned over time removing all those blank spaces at the end of CHAR and NCHAR strings.

-----Original Message-----
From: Paul Therrien [mailto:paultherrien@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Thursday, October 12, 2017 4:18 PM
To: 'Midrange Systems Technical Discussion' <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: RE: Why does USER require VARCHAR and not work with CHAR?

Yeah, I realized this after I responded to you. My only thinking on this is that the 'generate' option somehow forces you to model your database field after the attributes of the special register.

What if you changed the change_user field to not be a generate-always field, and allowed it to default like the create_user field?
There would be a chance that someone could overwrite the change_user field on an insert, but is this something you can live with?




Paul

-----Original Message-----
From: MIDRANGE-L [mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Glenn Gundermann
Sent: Thursday, October 12, 2017 4:36 PM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: Why does USER require VARCHAR and not work with CHAR?

Hi Paul,

My question is really asking why the first column is okay using CHAR and the second column not, when both are using the same special register.


Yours truly,

Glenn Gundermann
Email: glenn.gundermann@xxxxxxxxx
Work: (905) 486-1162 x 239
Cell: (416) 317-3144


On 12 October 2017 at 15:08, Paul Therrien <paultherrien@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

The USER special register is defined as Varchar(18) so I would guess
anything that uses the User would also need to be varchar(18).

From SQL Reference...
USER
The USER special register specifies the run-time authorization ID at
the current server. The data type of the special register is
VARCHAR(18).


Paul

-----Original Message-----
From: MIDRANGE-L [mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
Glenn Gundermann
Sent: Thursday, October 12, 2017 2:48 PM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Why does USER require VARCHAR and not work with CHAR?

Hi there,

IBM i 7.3, TR 2, cum level 17061, DB2 PTF group level 6

I have a CREATE TABLE statement where the create user column is using
CHAR(18) and the change user column won't allow CHAR(18) but works if
VARCHAR(18).
Why can't they both be CHAR(18)?

This won't work:

CREATE OR REPLACE TABLE glenn_test_table FOR SYSTEM NAME test_table (
create_user FOR COLUMN recrtuser CHAR(18) CCSID 37 NOT NULL DEFAULT
USER ,
change_user FOR COLUMN rechguser CHAR(18) CCSID 37 NOT NULL
GENERATED ALWAYS AS (USER) )
RCDFMT RPCMMNT

SQL0574 Column, sequence, or variable attribute is not valid.

This does work:

CREATE OR REPLACE TABLE glenn_test_table FOR SYSTEM NAME test_table (
create_user FOR COLUMN recrtuser CHAR(18) CCSID 37 NOT NULL DEFAULT
USER ,
change_user FOR COLUMN rechguser VARCHAR(18) CCSID 37 NOT NULL
GENERATED ALWAYS AS (USER) )
RCDFMT RPCMMNT

My question, why?


Yours truly,

Glenn Gundermann
Email: glenn.gundermann@xxxxxxxxx
Work: (905) 486-1162 x 239
Cell: (416) 317-3144
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