Re: Passing a Null Date to a Procedure

["Doug Palme" <DPalme@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hey Scott,
A thought just hit me, what if I passed in the keys for the data in the 
original file, did a chain and then tested for the *NULLIND locally in the 
procedure? 

The only difference is I am adding some overhead for the file lookup local 
to the procedure.

Thoughts?




From:   Scott Klement <rpg400-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To:     RPG programming on the IBM i / System i <rpg400-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date:   12/31/2009 12:36 PM
Subject:        Re: Passing a Null Date to a Procedure
Sent by:        rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx



Hi Doug,

You need to declare options(*NULLIND) on the prototype.  When you do 
that, RPG will automatically pass the null indicator with the parameter.

However, bear in mind that it's not possible to declare a field on 
D-spec with a null indicator.  That means parameters passed to this 
subprocedure have to be externally defined variables coming from 
null-capable PFs declared on an F-spec.   That severely limits the 
reusability of your subprocedure.  Personally I would give that a lot of 
thought before using options(*NULLIIND)



Doug Palme wrote:
> Is there any way to define a date value in a procedure interface as 
being 
> null capable? 
>
> I have checked the reference manual and so far have come up empty handed 

> on this.
>
> We have a file that allows for null capable dates and I have to pass 
this 
> value to a procedure for some processing, but it does not like the usage 

> of the %NULLIND parm.
>
>  *RNF0342 20      3 The parameter for %NULLIND is not valid; %NULLIND is 

> ignored
>
> *RNF0342 20    259 008812  Parameter WENDDATE for %NULLIND is not null 
> capable
>                            %NULLIND is ignored. 
>
> Suggestions?
>
> Douglas