Re: Lost in free format conversion.

On 2013/1/25 2:48 PM, Henrik Rützou wrote:

Yes Barara and my first solution to recieve a numeric in a alpha field was

d dsx ds
d dsa 1 5a
d dsn 1 5s 0

dsa = parmfield1;

dsn will then have the value of the original field1

My second in only /free was
[... snip code using bit operations ...]

Do you have a better solution WITHOUT changing the interface ?

_If_ it's necessary for the called program to deal with the parameter as both alpha and zoned, then I guess the data structure mechanism would be good, although it probably be better to define the dsx structure as a template and define the parameter directly as LIKEDS the template structure.

But I don't see anything in the original post to suggests that the called program actually needs to use the parameter as alpha.

Wait ... hmmm ... is it "changing the interface" to define the called program's parameter as zoned rather than alpha? Maybe, from a purist point of view. But I think it would be sufficient to just have a comment
d mypgm pi
// Note: The caller defines the parmField1 as alpha, but it
// actually contains a zoned value, so defining it as zoned here
D parmField1 5S 0