Alternate SQL Row-Selection Criteria

Hey, Ted:

For years I've been building flexible report applications by creating record-selection strings for Open Query File (OPNQRYF) at runtime, based on user input. For example, a user may select purchase order records by vendor number one time, and by a date field the next. Now I am embedding SQL SELECT statements in RPG programs and am finding it difficult to incorporate the same flexibility.

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SQL DayOfWeek Functions for Non-Date Data

Hey, Ted:

Our database stores all dates as numeric fields. Is there a way in SQL to convert a numeric date field (YYYYMMDD) into a date to use the day of week functions?

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Reader Feedback and Insights: Identity Columns and Performance

Hey, Ted:

I looked forward to using identity columns to replace and simplify the code we use to generate surrogate keys. In our application, when assigning surrogate keys, performance is critical: The application may need to generate keys for thousands or millions of new entities in a batch. To speed things up, we can parallel this task, but this requires mechanisms to ensure each parallel task assigns a unique surrogate key value each time. To simplify the logic, I wanted to implement identity columns to replace our own code.