Difference between EXTRCT vs. %subdt

[johnking@xxxxxxx]

Yikes - I just spent most of the morning debugging some code I converted
to /free over the weekend. I thought I'd pass on a difference between
EXTRCT and %subdt hoping to save someone else from the same headache.

The original program used EXTRCT to retrieve *month into a 0-filled 2-char
field:
C                   Eval      w_Date = %date()
C                   Extrct    w_Date:*m     w_Char2

I assumed this /free code was equivalent. Boy, was I wrong...
           w_Char2  = %editc(%subdt( w_Date : *months ) : 'X');

The %subdt BIF does not automatically adjust the size of its workfields
according to the 2nd parameter. Unless explicitly defined, it uses a 10,0
decimal field which caused the %editc to give unexpected results. It would
have been a bonus if the compiler automatically used a 2,0 workfield when
processing *M and *D values, but I guess you can't have everything! My
solution was to code two /free statements:
           w_Dec2  = %subdt( w_Date : *months );
           w_Char2 = %editC( w_Dec2 : 'X' );

JK