Use host variables in REXX applications that use SQL

REXX does not provide for variable declarations.

LOB, ROWID, and binary host variables are not supported in REXX. New variables are recognized by their appearance in assignment statements. Therefore, there is no declare section, and the BEGIN DECLARE SECTION and END DECLARE SECTION statements are not supported.

All host variables within an SQL statement must be preceded by a colon (:).

The SQL/REXX interface performs substitution in compound variables before passing statements to the database manager. For example:

a = 1
b = 2
EXECSQL 'OPEN c1 USING :x.a.b'

causes the contents of x.1.2 to be passed to SQL.

Determine data types of input host variables in REXX applications that use SQL
All data in REXX is in the form of strings.
The format of output host variables in REXX applications that use SQL
It is not necessary to determine the data type of an output host variable (that is, a host variable used in an 'INTO host variable' clause in a FETCH statement).
Avoid REXX conversion in REXX applications that use SQL
To guarantee that a string is not converted to a number or assumed to be of graphic type, strings should be enclosed in the following: "'". Simply enclosing the string in single quotation marks does not work.

Parent topic: Code SQL statements in REXX applications