I'm a big proponent of packed. I also deal with high volumes of data, so it's a leanness concern. I'm almost embarrassed to say that I didn't know a physical file could have an integer field. (I use them in RPG all the time, however.)
I think I used DSPPFM 10 years ago. I exclusively use DBU and SQL.
-Kurt
-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Joe Pluta
Sent: Friday, September 02, 2011 7:02 AM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion
Subject: Storing Numeric Values in the Database
Generally speaking, what is the current wisdom about storing numeric data in the database? Do folks still prefer packed representation for data with decimal positions? Zoned is a little easier on the eyes when looking at a raw record, but it takes a few more bytes especially as the fields get larger. And as far as I know RPG still likes to convert things to packed when it reads a file unless you tell it not to. That being the case is there still a performance issue these days?
We like zoned fields here, but I'm trying to address the issue from a thorough technical standpoint. If you're trying to be as lean as possible, you could argue that integers should be stored in binary, although that has its own issues. Heck, an argument could be made that you should store all data as integers with implied digits and decimal positions.
What say you all?
Joe
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