Quick - debugging "Data expression e

[pickerij@norbord.com]

Arthur.Kogan@cognos.com comments ...
<snip>
>Now here is something that might be usefull. I had a case with one
>customer getting the same error and it was happening between the "let"
>satements. What it was, was this: he had a "get file optional" statement
>accessing a file using a field from another file. The linking field
>although of the same name, was defined as char*8 in one file and char*10
>in another. So, when the value was upto 8 characters, there was no error
>and the link was made (assuming there was an appropriate match), but if
>the value was 9 or 10 characters, they got the error.
<snip>

Huh? Was this deemed "normal" (and therefore "correct") behaviour?? It   
seems to me that Powerhouse should have simply truncated the longer   
string to the length of the shorter one, as it would do in a simple   
assignment using the LET verb. There should be no manipulation of the   
data other than simple truncation if required in both of these cases. I   
would expect a "data expression" error only if I was altering the values   
via some function or doing arithmetic operations. Further info re version   
and platform would be nice.

John Pickering
JWP Systems Inc
Toronto