RE: Why you shouldn't be afraid to use VARCHAR in RPGLE

Hi Niels,

%IF does not (yet?!) exist.
But it would be easy to code ... and for different data types the function can be overloaded.

Mit freundlichen Grüßen / Best regards

Birgitta Hauser
Modernization – Education – Consulting on IBM i
Database and Software Architect
IBM Champion since 2020

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-----Original Message-----
From: RPG400-L <rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Niels Liisberg
Sent: Saturday, 13 December 2025 12:56
To: RPG programming on IBM i <rpg400-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: Why you shouldn't be afraid to use VARCHAR in RPGLE

It's there already: check the %IF

Result = %IF(MyField = 'A' : 'Yes' : 'No'); // Assigns 'Yes' or 'No


On Fri, Dec 12, 2025 at 7:33 PM Marco Facchinetti < marco.facchinetti@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Christmas is approaching and perhaps the compilers' team is in the
mood for
gifts:

https://ibm-power-systems.ideas.ibm.com/ideas/IBMI-I-4748

Best regards
--
Marco Facchinetti

Mr S.r.l.

Tel. 035 962885
Cel. 393 9620498

Skype: facchinettimarco


Il giorno ven 12 dic 2025 alle ore 18:24 James H. H. Lampert via
RPG400-L < rpg400-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> ha scritto:

On 12/10/25 8:04 PM, Barbara Morris wrote:

It's a single pass through the source but it gathers information
that

it

can use multiple times.

The compiler usually allows forward-referencing, so you can code

LIKE(x)

where x is defined later.

Interesting. But note my exact words: "pure single-pass." As in
compiling directly from source to executable in a single pass.

Pascal is pure single-pass. Forward-referencing is explicitly
prohibited except for *very* limited circumstances, involving an
*explicit* declaration as such.

Then again, when he designed Pascal (purely as a teaching language
for structured programming), Niklaus Wirth had some really stupid
ideas in his head. Like the notion that a FOR loop will always run
to completion under normal circumstances (even though it's trivially
simple to come up with cases in which FOR is the preferred loop
construct, premature exit is the norm, and completion is the exception).

--
JHHL
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