Hai all..

We are trying to report on IMS mainframe database.
It seems in IMS (cobol), sometime a field is redefined to another field and they both share same memory.

On the webfocus we use a condition to use either of those fields.
There is no problem when both are Alphanumeric or both are packed.
But at a particular situation, one is packed-decimal and other is alpha-numeric.
Conversions using PTOA etc did not help. It gives FORMAT CONVERSION ERROR. DATA EXCEPTION.

Can anyone have any suggestions please.?

Thanks..

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

Define your field in the master as alphanumeric, i.e. Ann. Then refer to the "Using Functions" manual to read up on the CHKPCK subroutine. That should do what you need.

Thanks for the suggestion. Already tried that but did not work

It has been a long time since I have done any IMS/DL1. But when a segment has two different layouts best practices suggest a segment type indicator. Have you tried using this as a RECTYPE in your master?

Thanks Jim.
We found the same and we are working on it now..