Problem with commas in user settings in 4.0, WS

Question

There seems to be a problem returning user settings with GetUserSettings. The setting that contains a comma is being chopped.
Dim ptSettings, ptUserSettings
Set ptSettings = Server.CreateObject("GSServices.Settings")
Set ptUserSettings = ptSettings.GetUserSettings
Response.Write "<br>'" & ptUserSettings("strLastName") & "'"
For example this instead of 'Clayton, Jr', 'Clayto' is being displayed. The setting is correct in the PTMYPAGESPREFS table. Has anybody came across this problem, and maybe found a solution or a workaround? Thanks.
Dmitriy Karpov
[email protected]

Answer 1

I believe the problem is the following:
You have an app that calls directly into Plumtree.dll to set preferences. Those preferences may have non-alphanumeric characters, which are stored fine in the database.
You then want to retrieve these preferences through the EDK/GDK. The issue is, when EDK/GDK encounters non-alphanumeric characters, it encodes them using %u encoding before sending them over the wire to be stored in the DB. So, the data that's stored in DB is encoded, then it's sent back over the wire to EDK/GDK, which unencodes the prefs, and gives them to the calling app.
If the EDK/GDK encounters unencoded prefs sent over the wire, the behavior is undefined -- it's quite possible that's what you're seeing.
Basically, the trick is to store and retrieve preferences the same way -- either store them & retrieve them via direct calls to Plumtree API, or store them and retrieve them via EDK/GDK. If you have to store the prefs via the API and retrieve them in EDK/GDK, you HAVE to encode them the same way the EDK/GDK would encode them if it stored them.
BTW, what are the exact versions of the portal and EDK/GDK you are using?