Hello Ann,

Thursday, October 14, 2004, 7:21:48 PM, you wrote:

> One wonders why they don't allow negative lengths so
> we could have things like this...

> substring ('abcdefghij' from 12 for -4) => 'ij'

Because in the standard docs, it's mentioned that the end position has
to be after the start position.

So, in the example above, that would be an error since the end
position (Start position(12) + Substring length(-4) = End position(8))
will be before the start position.

--
Best regards,
Daniel Rail
Senior Software Developer
ACCRA Group Inc. (www.accra.ca)
ACCRA Med Software Inc. (www.filopto.com)