Re: AW: V7R1 Field Procedures

[Barbara Morris <bmorris@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On 3/18/2011 11:52 AM, Vern Hamberg wrote:
> Isn't a B (binary) type defined as 2 or 4 or 8? The number of bytes? Not
> the number of digits? I'd recommend 5i 0. That's what the Data Type
> Compatibility chart says in the Run-Time Library Reference. Both int and
> long int are 10i 0.

The RPG and DDS B type is actually a decimal type, with decimal 
positions.  It's just stored as a binary. In RPG, it gets converted back 
and forth to packed before it is used. So you can define a B-binary as 2 
digits with 1 decimal place or 8 digits with 3 decimal places etc.

5B uses a 4-byte binary for storage, so for sure it isn't a match for a 
short integer.

I think the 2B used in the SQL examples was probably a misunderstanding 
probably caused by translating from the RPG III from-and-to positions 
1-2B. It works ok though, and I think you could even get away with 1B 
for the SQL indicator since anything from 1 to 4 digits means two bytes. 
I agree that 5i makes the most sense.