Hi Tim, allow me to elaborate a little here. if you are referring to what I think you are referring to, this is not an ANSI/ISO bug but rather a feature ;-) it is not a matter of what you are physically storing in your database, but rather a matter of comparison semantics when dealing with strings of different lengths -- the two options are: padded vs non-padded semantics. Cheers, Lex. PS: adding leading zero's to a numeric attribute does not change its value; adding trailing spaces to an alphanumeric attribute DOES change its value. > Warren, > > This is a bug with the ANSI SQL standard. > > Try using the following instead: > > SELECT * > FROM PTMBT01 T01, > PTMBT02 T02 > WHERE T01.COL2 = RPAD(T02.COL2,30,' '); > > Or: > > SELECT * > FROM PTMBT01 T01, > PTMBT02 T02 > WHERE RTRIM(T01.COL2) = T02.COL2; > > There is no practical justification for the CHAR and NCHAR datatypes; > storing trailing spaces in the database as much sense as consuming storage > to store leading zero's in a numeric. These datatypes exist only to ensure > that Oracle doesn't get dinged by competitors that it doesn't meet the full > ANSI standard. > > Hope this helps... > > -Tim > > > on 5/4/04 6:50 PM, Warren Homer at wazhomer@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote: > > > Hi all, > > > > we are currently running Oracle 9.2.0.1.0 on AIX 4.3. > > > > I am trying to join two tables on a varchar2(50) field and a CHAR(30) field > > where both are defined as NOT NULL. Although these two fields have the same > > value inserted Oracle interprets these two columns to be NOT equal. I have > > tried the same SQL test on a Window 2000 Oracle 9.2.0.3.0 environment > > without any problems. Is this a bug in Oracle 9201 or a problem with AIX ? > > Thanks in advance for any help. > > ---------------------------------------------------------------- > Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.com > ---------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe send email to: oracle-l-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx > put 'unsubscribe' in the subject line. > -- > Archives are at //www.freelists.org/archives/oracle-l/ > FAQ is at //www.freelists.org/help/fom-serve/cache/1.html > ----------------------------------------------------------------- > ---------------------------------------------------------------- Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.com ---------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe send email to: oracle-l-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx put 'unsubscribe' in the subject line. -- Archives are at //www.freelists.org/archives/oracle-l/ FAQ is at //www.freelists.org/help/fom-serve/cache/1.html -----------------------------------------------------------------