Re: S/36 F-spec allowed dotted names? was: EXTNAME questions...

[dhandy@xxxxxxxxxxx (Douglas Handy)]

Dan,

>>> F-spec filenames.  I agree that it would make sense to allow any
>>> legitimate AS/400 object name to be used on the F-spec.

>Uh, what did you disagree on?  The second sentence or the third?  I'm guessing
>the third, so...  

Sorry to be vague.  I don't consider it weird (the second sentence).
To me it is like using ExtProc() to give a short, case-insensitive
name to a procedure under V3R2/V3R6 which would otherwise not be
allowable.  From V3R7 on, this is less of a problem, but try calling
some of the stuff like DSM api calls without it...

Using ExtName() to allow external names to not conform to language
semantics is not weird, it's a pretty elegant solution, IMHO.

Regarding the third sentence:

>>>  I agree that it would make sense to allow any
>>> legitimate AS/400 object name to be used on the F-spec.

Actually, I guess I don't disagree it may "make sense", but I
definitely wouldn't call it a bug or serious shortcoming (and I
realize you didn't either).

Actually, I suppose it may be nice if they just added an F-spec
keyword for ExtName() to avoid the need to use OVRDBF for those cases
where people didn't need a substitution expression (eg AR.CUST).  I
was never in that camp, but there must be some who are.

Doug
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