varchar vs char

[fernando.olmos at hpa.com.au]

Can someone please explain why this is happening and is it correct? 

Why is it that in PH (and this does not happen in Oracle), a column with
a varchar will retain any trailing spaces when data with spaces after
the last char is read into it?

ie:     
        define a varchar * 10 = "abc   "        ;has 3 spaces after the
'c' letter 
        define b char*20 = "|" + a + "|" 
        report a b 
        go 

This shows ... 

  A           B 

  abc         |abc   | 

Of course if I change the B define to trunc() the A define it works ... 

        define b char*20 = "|" + trunc(a) + "|" 

It won't make any difference if I change the char*20 to varchar*20
either. 

I don't want to have to use trunc(). We have tons of columns we're
migrating over to a new PH environment that are all varchars. I don't
want to have to specify trunc() on ever item that populates those
columns. Is there a setting in PH that tells the dictionary to
"naturally" trunc()?

Thanks again gang. 

Fernando Olmos 
M.I.S. 

HPA
Direct:  03 9217 5411
Mobile: 0410 382 857
Fax:     03 9217 5716 

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