RE: free-format move *USA date value to 6-digit numeric in YMDformat

 <snip>
I just don't understand why IBM doesn't do this. Sure there are
political
reason or fake technical reasons, but who cares about those?
</snip>

I do....LOL


Thanks,
Tommy Holden


-----Original Message-----
From: rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Bob Cozzi
Sent: Wednesday, December 28, 2005 10:35 AM
To: 'RPG programming on the AS400 / iSeries'
Subject: RE: free-format move *USA date value to 6-digit numeric in
YMDformat

Herein lies the greats "downside" to RPGIV:
> V5R2:
>    numFld = %int(%char(dateFld:*YMD0));

> V5R3:
>    numFld = %dec(dateFld:*YMD);

So various ways to solve problems based on the release level. And I
don't
mean they added XML support in V5R4 and it should be PTF'd back to V3R1,
I
mean in V5R1, V5R2 and V5R3 there are subtle "enhancements" to the
language
that are all related (such as the example above) in which partial
solutions
are introduced in a point release and then the next part of the solution
is
introduced in the next point release and so on. 
Try teaching RPG IV to students at various release levels. Crap like the
above is becoming more and more wide-spread in the language. "If you're
on
V5R3 you do it this way, if you're on 5.2 you do it this way, but if
you're
on 5.1 you can get around it by doing it this way..."

IBM should stabilize RPG IV at a version boundary and release ALL
enhancements to that version/release boundary. That is all V5
enhancements
should work on V5R1 and later. If it won't work on V5R1 then they have
to
wait until V6 to ship the enhancement. 

I just don't understand why IBM doesn't do this. Sure there are
political
reason or fake technical reasons, but who cares about those?
-Bob Cozzi