Big-Data-HPC-Platform/docs/ECLLanguageReference/ECLR_mods/Value-Data.xml

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<!DOCTYPE sect1 PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.5//EN"
"http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.5/docbookx.dtd">
<sect1 id="DATA">
  <title>DATA<indexterm>
      <primary>DATA</primary>
    </indexterm><indexterm>
      <primary>DATA value type</primary>
    </indexterm></title>

  <para><emphasis role="bold">DATA[</emphasis><emphasis>n</emphasis><emphasis
  role="bold">]</emphasis></para>

  <para>A "packed hexadecimal<indexterm>
      <primary>packed hexadecimal</primary>
    </indexterm>" data block of <emphasis>n</emphasis> bytes, zero padded (not
  space-padded). If <emphasis>n </emphasis>is omitted, the DATA is variable
  length to the size needed to contain the result of the cast or passed
  parameter. Type casting is allowed but only to a STRING or UNICODE of the
  same number of bytes.</para>

  <para>This type is particularly useful for containing BLOB (Binary Large
  OBject) data. See the Programmer's Guide article <emphasis
  role="bold">Working with BLOBs</emphasis> for more information on this
  subject.</para>

  <para>Example:</para>

  <programlisting>DATA8 MyHexString := x'1234567890ABCDEF'; 
        // an 8-byte data block - hex values 12 34 56 78 90 AB CD EF</programlisting>
</sect1>