Re: Clear entire field vs substring

No, not Forth, RPG.

Norm Dennis


----- Reply message -----
From: "Albert York" <alfromme@xxxxxxxxx>
To: "RPG programming on the IBM i / System i" <rpg400-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Clear entire field vs substring
Date: Tue, May 22, 2012 07:42


Thanks everyone.

I will go forth and clear no more;

Albert


On Mon, May 21, 2012 at 3:00 PM, Vern Hamberg <vhamberg@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

You don't - but why even do this when you set the varying field to some
value - esp. if that value is a varying one, whether it is the result of
a %trim operation or some other - almost all the string operations now
return varying-length values.

I am going to take a firm stand!!! Watch out!!!

There is almost no need ever at all to blank out or initialize character
fields/variables in RPG anymore!!!

Just set the blame thing and be done with it. And be careful to trim
fixed-length values.

OK, soapbox has officially fallen apart!

Vern

On 5/21/2012 4:25 PM, Alan Campin wrote:

If I have a varying field, I just do a %Len(WorkField) = 0 Why would I need
to move in blanks.

On Mon, May 21, 2012 at 3:22 PM, Jon Paris<jon.paris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>  wrote:

On 2012-05-21, at 3:54 PM, rpg400-l-request@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

I have a work field that is 2000 bytes (to allow for the longest

possible string value). The length of the data being moved to it varies and
can be quite short. I have to clear the work field before I move the data.

Which is better:

Neither are necessary.

An eval will always clear unused bytes in the back end of the string.

I think Chuck is wrong about the varying in that I'm fairly certain that
it actually places blanks in the back end of the field even though (because
of the length) it doesn't need to. It certainly pads when you use %Len to
increase the field length. I seem to recall a conversation with Barbara
where she told me that they had decided that setting the back end of a
varying to blanks was probably a waste of time but by then couldn't change
the behaviour because undoubtedly someone had decided it was a "feature" by
then.


Jon Paris

www.partner400.com
www.SystemiDeveloper.com




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