RE: Case conversion (was Re: Large Return values)

Joep,

<snip>
> I'm not sure I see any advantages of a %TOUPPER() built-in since it 
> would be nothing more than a wrapper for the function iconv().

And of course every RPG programmer should be comfortable with a
prototype like:

size_t iconv (cd, inbuf, inbytesleft,
               outbuf, outbytesleft)

             iconv_t     cd;
             char        **inbuf;
             size_t      *inbytesleft;
             char        **outbuf;
             size_t      *outbytesleft;

BIFs are for wimps; real programmers use APIs.
</snip>

I actually found it easiest to write the API wrappers in C and then just
call the whole wrapper from RPG.  This example converts my strings to
ASCII to send over a socket connection....  I think most all RPG
programmers could prototype this two pointer function.

/*                                                 
                                                   
   int CvtToASCII(PCHAR Input, PINT InLen)         
                                                   
   This function converts EBCDIC to ASCII          
                                                   
   Input           : Input buffer to be converted  
   InLen           : Length of Input Buffer        
   Returns: -1 for error                           
                                                   
*/                                                 
int CvtToASCII(PCHAR Input, PINT InLen)            
{                                                  
                                                   
    CHAR        Ascii_Buf[CNV_BUF_LEN];            
    PCHAR       Sav_Buf = NULL;                    
    CHAR        from_code[32];                     
    CHAR        to_code[32];                                            
    iconv_t     adc;                                                    
    INT         rc = 0;                                                 
    INT         Ascii_Len = CNV_BUF_LEN;                                
    PCHAR       Ebcdic_Buf = Input;                                     
    INT         Ebcdic_Len = *InLen;                                    
                                                                        
    Sav_Buf   = (PCHAR) &Ascii_Buf;                                     
    memset((PCHAR) &from_code, 0, sizeof(from_code));                   
    memset((PCHAR) &to_code, 0, sizeof(to_code));                       
    strncpy((PCHAR) &from_code, "IBMCCSID000000000000", 20);            
    strncpy((PCHAR) &to_code,   "IBMCCSID00437", 13);                   
    /* Code Conversion Allocation API */                                
    adc = iconv_open((PCHAR) &to_code, (PCHAR) &from_code);             
                                                                        
    rc = iconv(adc, (const char**) &Ebcdic_Buf, (unsigned int*)
&Ebcdic_Len, 
                    &Sav_Buf, (unsigned int*) &Ascii_Len);              
    if (rc != -1)                                          
        memcpy(Input, &Ascii_Buf, sizeof(char) * (*InLen));
                                                           
    /* Code Conversion Deallocation API */                 
    iconv_close(adc);                                      
    return (rc);                                           
}                                                          

Andy

PS - Don't tell David I posted C code (ugly code at that) on the RPG
forum :)