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Dictionary Date Formats (AREV Specific)

At 30 JUL 2003 04:15:53PM Lisa Wright wrote:

We are using version 3.12. We used a bracketed function name, DATE_FORMAT, in the Output Format field of a dictionary field for a date. Now no SELECT statements using this dictionary field will work. A LIST displays the dates correctly. What can we do to make the SELECT statement work?

At 30 JUL 2003 04:23PM Steve Smith wrote:

What's in the input format field?

Can you give examples of the code in the DATE_FORMAT routine?

What happens if you take out the DATE_FORMAT from the dictionary?

At 30 JUL 2003 04:35PM Lisa Wright wrote:

I don't see an "input format field." We have DATE as the Data Type and D2/ or (D) as the Validation Patterns. Does that answer your question?

Here's the code for the function:

FUNCTION DATE_FORMAT(D1,D2,D3,D4)

D4=OCONV(D2,"D2/":XLATE("TABLE",1,11,"X")) ;* where the xlate gets a conversion character, either null or "E".

RETURN D4

If we take out the DATE_FORMAT and use D2/ it works perfectly.

Thanks for the help,

Lisa Wright

At 30 JUL 2003 04:58PM Richard Hunt wrote:

Lisa,

From what you explained, "DATE_FORMAT" is a "user defined conversion". Although your function DATE_FORMAT is not programmed correctly for a "user defined conversion".

I have noticed two possible problems.

1) You are declaring it as a "FUNCTION" and not as a "SUBROUTINE".

2) You have no "ICONV" conversion.

It should be more like this…

SUBROUTINE DATE_FORMAT(TYPE,VALUE,BRANCH,RETURN_VALUE)

BEGIN CASE

CASE TYPE EQ 'ICONV'

RETURN_VALUE=ICONV(VALUE,'D')

CASE TYPE EQ 'OCONV'

RETURN_VALUE=OCONV(VALUE,'D2/':XLATE('TABLE',1,11,'X'))

END CASE

RETURN

END

At 30 JUL 2003 05:10PM Lisa Wright wrote:

That works wonderfully! We were just feeling our way through this and have no documentation (that we could find, anyway). Where did you get your information? We would love to get our hands on it!

Thanks so much,

Lisa Wright

At 30 JUL 2003 07:14PM Richard Hunt wrote:

Lisa,

I can not remember where I got the original information from. I think it was in the documentation or from an AREV user group meeting.

These info bits might help you.

1) The arguments passed for the subroutine are as follows…

RETURN_VALUE=TYPE(VALUE,'SUB_NAME,BRANCH')

A) TYPE, valid values are ICONV and OCONV.

B) VALUE, string to be converted.

C) BRANCH, optional extra data.

D) RETURN_VALUE, the actual converted string.

2) You might want to set the STATUS() variable as follows…

A) STATUS()=0 if conversion is good.

B) STATUS()=1 if conversion failed.

C) STATUS()=2 if TYPE is invalid.

D) STATUS()=3 if conversion failed and you do not want AREV to display an error message.

3) At the beginning of the subroutine, I would make RETURN_VALUE=VALUE. Then if the conversion is good, set RETURN_VALUE to the good conversion.

At 31 JUL 2003 05:27AM Richard Bright wrote:

User_Defined_Conversion info (and much more) can be found on this site in the AREV Knowledgebase 8/20/98 - System Subroutines and ….

This info was originally DOCed in an Appendix Disk with ARev v2.x or something published before the dawn of time.

At 31 JUL 2003 11:27AM Victor Engel wrote:

Note that an LIST command will invoke the user-defined conversion (UDC) with the input conversion setting but using the output conversion code, so your UDC must be able to process output conversion codes as input conversions. This was discussed in some detail by Sprezzatura in Revmedia volume 2, Issue 5.

At 31 JUL 2003 03:43PM Dave Harmacek wrote:

Page 408 of the ARev R/Basic Manual also documents them. Do you have those manuals? My last is dated 9/1992 for Version 3.0.

At 04 AUG 2003 05:07PM Lisa Wright wrote:

We've got the R/Basic manual. I guess we just didn't know what to look for. Thanks a lot, all of you.

Lisa Wright

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