Data element change

Question

Hi
I have created a custom table and created a data elemnent of type NUMC.
It has reached production . The table entries are created in production.
Now the users want to change the data element to char.
if the data element is changed from numc to char and released to production ,w ill the existing entries will be deleted ??
reg
Ramya

Answer 1

Hi Ramya S  ,
You have created a data element of type NUMC, which means some field in ur table has data type NUMC right? And now users want it to be CHAR right?
Well definitely this field must be used in some program right?
You have 2 ways :
1)  You can change the data element, the entries won't get deleted. But yes slight change in format will take place, like preceding zeros will be seen in character format as per the length on the field defined...well thats because different data types have their own features.
2)  Another way is keep the data element same as NUMC.
and you can change the data type of the field which you are using, in the code itself.
For Example : You have a field value a of type numc defined in table.
when defining internal table to use this field...u will as usual define it and it wud be in NUMC datatype.
then you can declare another variable b of type char of specific length and then assign a to b.
E.g.:
Table : EMPLOYEE
Field  :EMPLOYEE_NO                
Data Element  : ZEMP_NO
Data Type : NUMC
In Code :
Declaring Internal Table ***
Data : Begin of itab,
             employee_no  TYPE employee-zemployee_no,
          End of itab.
Variable of type CHAR ***
Data : employee_no_new(10) TYPE c.
Assigning old value to new variable ***
employee_no_new  = itab-employee_no.
now all the values will have properties of data type CHAR. You can even send it to production...won't give any problems...
I have just given an example...you can try this for the feld you have created. Hope this helps you.
If any more doubts, do revert
Regards,
Radhika
Edited by: RadhikaS on Mar 25, 2009 6:18 PM