#36 fields larger than 256 in CA-Clipper DB

[John]

In CA-Clipper character field lengths greater than 255 characters are represented by a combination of the Field_dec and the Field_len fields. The Field_len field stores the result of length % 256, while the Field_dec field stores the result of length / 256. Therefore, to calculate the actual field length of a character field you must check whether it has a value in the Field_dec > 0 and if it does, you set the length = Field_dec * 256 + Field_len.

As an example, I have a database with a 260 character field. The Field_dec = 1 and the Field_len = 4. Currently this library sees the field as being a 4 character field and truncates the field value. The example database is attached.

[John]

Example of CA-Clipper based DBF

[Joe McVerry]

added in version 20140310