My client is currently on WF7.7.02 and I've noticed a new default behavior for many of the relational database data adapters including all the major REBMS players.

I've done numerous searches through techsupport and there are other no public references to this issue, the impact this change has on read and/or write behavior.

Might sound like a really silly question, "Is there a reason for wanting trailing spaces EVER?"

From the "Adapter Administration for UNIX, Windows, OpenVMS, i5/OS, and z/OS Version 7 Release 7.02"

DN4501040.1110 Just released version!

Trailing Blanks in SQL Expressions
The new SQL Expression generator in the TABLE Adapter by default preserves literal contents, including trailing blanks in string literals and the fractional part and exponential notation in numeric literals. This allows greater control over the generated SQL.
In some rare cases when trailing blanks are not needed, the following syntax

ENGINE SQLMSS SET TRIM_LITERALS ON

is available to ensure backward compatibility.

Any comments on this issue is appreciated.

Thanks,

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kerry,

John, I agree, I cannot think of a reason to preserve trailing spaces, ever.

I did have one situation a few years ago where I was trying to select values from an Oracle DB which had a char(3) field. The values that I was looking for only contained two characters and required the trailing space to get the data back, but WF was stripping the trailing blank from the where clause before sending to Oracle to be processed.

To work around the issue, the dba change the field from character to variable character to resolve the issue.

Is this the behavior that your reffering to?

Rob,

I opened a case on this topic to gather more information from IBI on how this feature changes behavior. I will publish their position on this change when I hear back on this issue.

Your note does describe why a trailing space would be needed in a WebFOCUS FEX, though other techniques could be used to bypass this default behavior.

The SQL world handles trailing spaces much more elegantly, duly noting each RDBMS can handle this situation differently.

Thank you for posting your experience!

Sincerely,