RE: CCSID - RPG issues

Without having seen your program and H- and D-Specifications for defining your data structures ... it is hard to say what happened.
... but per default is everything converted into the Job CCSID, so the Hex-Value in your program (CCSID 37) can differ from the hex-Value in your file (CCSID 1208)

In RPG when using native I/O in a cyclic Main procedure without output into a data structure, RPG generates automatically I/O Buffer (but the character data are converted into JOBCCSID).

If you want to avoid this, you have to read your data into a data structure, but you have to suppress any conversion.
This can be done by adding the Keyword DATA(*NOCVT) to the file in the F-Specs and CCSID(*EXACT) to the Data structure Definition.
With DATA(*NOCVT) are the file data is not converted when reading the data
With CCSID(*EXACT) the (unconverted) read data is moved unconverted into the data structure.

Example: 
DCL-F MyFile Keyed Data(*NoCvt);
DCL-DS OutputDS ExtName('MYFILE': *ALL) CCSID(*EXACT) END-DS;

Mit freundlichen Grüßen / Best regards

Birgitta Hauser
Modernization – Education – Consulting on IBM i
Database and Software Architect  
IBM Champion since 2020

"Shoot for the moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the stars." (Les Brown)
"If you think education is expensive, try ignorance." (Derek Bok)
"What is worse than training your staff and losing them? Not training them and keeping them!"
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-----Original Message-----
From: RPG400-L <[email protected]> On Behalf Of Gad Miron
Sent: Thursday, 26 February 2026 07:21
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: CCSID - RPG issues

an update - (re)cheking

1. adding   *NATURAL as 4th parameter to %subst did not solve the issue.
2. when comparing the Hex value of the source field (ds_NMMLIMP2.ITEMNAME)
    in debug (EVAL ds_NMMLIMP2.ITEMNAME :x 512)
    to the it's value in the (source) file
    I've found they are NOT the SAME*.*

The value in debug is
00000     0036932F F0F5F3D4 D3E6F9D6 E9E491A8
00010     99C3E96D D8404040 40404040 40404040
00020     40404040 40404040 40400014 C380206C
00030     61206669 6E206465 206C27C3 A974C3A9
00040     20202020 20202020 20202020 20202020

The Hex value in the file is
349848894884973A3444444444444444
F031069504503DF3F000000000000000

Value of select HEX(ITEMNAME) from NMMLIMP2 is
C380206C612066696E206465206C27C3A974C3A9

the actual text is
À la fin de l'été
Hope anyone can make heads and tails of it


Gad


> date: Tue, 24 Feb 2026 09:29:25 -0500
> from: Barbara Morris <[email protected]>
> subject: Re: CCSID - RPG issues
>
> On 2026-02-24 8:56 a.m., Gad Miron wrote:
> > ...
> >     // take first 128 chars of Item Description
> >          ds_NMWRKR.ITEMNAME8 = %subst(ds_NMMLIMP2.ITEMNAME :1 : 128) 
> > ;
> >
> >      // Update map file - target
> >           update NMWRKR ds_NMWRKR  ;
> >
> > C                   eval      *INLR = *ON
> >
> > The update works but the value placed in ITEMNAME8 is erroneous ...
> In debug, does ds_NMMLIMP2.ITEMNAME look correct before the %subst? 
> Does it have UTF8 data? (look at the hex value of the field in the 
> debugger)
>
> Does ds_NMWRKR.ITEMNAME8 look correct after the %subst?
>
> Is it always incorrect? Or does the problem only happen with some values?
>
> Using %subst with UTF8 data has the potential to only pick up the 
> first byte of a 2-byte character unless you are using the new 
> CHARCOUNT NATURAL support.
>
> https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/i/7.5.0?topic=functions-subst-get-substrin
> g
>
>
> https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/i/7.5.0?topic=cdt-processing-string-data-b
> y-natural-size-each-character
>
> (I should update that pdf document to talk about the CHARCOUNT support 
> that was added in 7.4 and 7.5 with PTFs.)
>
> --
> Barbara
>
>
>
>
--
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