Re: Oracle Forms 2.3 question on possible bug in using to_char

In article <2ged0k$7v5_at_linus.mitre.org>, Dagmar A. Bogan <dagmar_at_indian.mitre.org> wrote:
>Sorry, I don't know about your specific bug, however....Forms 2.3 does not
>use the same level of SQL*Plus as the kernel, it uses UFI (User Friendly
>Interface). When I developed 2.3 forms many years ago, I do remember certain
>functions would work in SQL*Plus but would not in Forms...this may be another
>example.
>
>Dagmar

Dagmar - Please clarify your message a little for me. Are you saying that you, personally wrote part of Oracle Forms 2.3 (as an employee of Oracle) many years ago, or are you saying that you used it as an application's programmer? Also, I was told from a number of Oracle employees that Oracle uses the same kernel routines to process SQL*PLUS that are used in SQL*Forms. Does anybody know if these statements are true?

As far as the 2.3 "bug" I found, I got around the problem by simply writing a trigger that moves the numeric sequence no. into the screen character field. Then, I just get the length of the sequence no. and concatenate the proper no. of zeroes to the beginning of the string. Not very elegant, but it works! Did something like this:

select donor_seq
into :donor.donor_code
from last_donor

select length(:donor.donor_code)
into :donor.num_chars
from dual

#exemacro case :donor.num_chars is

   when '1' then exetrg pad4;
   when '2' then exetrg pad3;
   when '3' then exetrg pad2;
   when '4' then exetrg pad1;
   when '5' then null;

Each Pad trigger (a good exercise would be to combine them into one trigger) is sort of like this:

pad4: select '0000' || :donor.donor_code

      into :donor.donor_code
      from dual

I think Oracle SQL*Forms before 3.0 came out looks like "Chicken Scratch" and I don't have the foggiest idea why that package became one of the most popular windowing type of Forms package the world ever seen??!! It is lacking even the most rudimentary progamming capabilities. As a whole, 4GLs suck, since they force you to program around their deficiencies. But, organizations love them, cuz you can create a 2 month programming wonder. No long 3 year time span to become expert at C or whatever!! But, this is my opinion only and I'm sure lots of people love them :-) Actually, SQL*PLUS is great, just needs some procedural capabilities, but I guess that is why PL/SQL was invented. Finally, at our site we have Rexx to get around lots of the "walls".

These opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of The Peace Corps, but my response expresses my opinons!

• Mike Winters U.S. Peace Corps (202)606-3330

>
>******************************************************************************
>The opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of The MITRE
>Corporation.
>******************************************************************************
>
>******************************************************************************
>Dagmar Anne Bogan *
>Software Engineering Center *
>The MITRE Corporation * phone: 703.883.6093
>M/S Z676 * fax: 703.883.6991
>7525 Colshire Drive * email: dagmar_at_indian.mitre.org
>McLean, Virginia 22102-3481 *
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Received on Thu Jan 06 1994 - 06:22:23 CET