Data types and values

The table below lists the OpenEdge SQL data types and value limits.

Table 1. SQL data type limits
SQL data type Limit
BIGINT –9,223,372,036,854,775,808 to 9,223,372,036,854,775,807
BINARY 2000 bytes
BIT 0 or 1
BLOB 1GB
CHAR 2000 characters
CLOB 1GB
DATE Year: 1 to 9999; Month: 1 through 12; Date: 1 through the last day of the month
DECIMAL Defined in terms of precision and scale; precision=number of digits; scale=number of digits to the right of the decimal point
Note: The scale cannot be greater than precision—precision is limited to 50; scale is limited to 10
DOUBLE PRECISION 2.2250738585072014E–308 through 1.7976931348623157E+308
FLOAT 2.2250738585072014E–308 through 1.7976931348623157E+308
INTEGER –2,147,483,648 to 2,147,483,647
NUMERIC Defined in terms of precision and scale; precision=number of digits; scale=number of digits to the right of the decimal point
Note: The scale cannot be greater than precision—precision is limited to 50; scale is limited to 10
REAL 1.175494351E–38F to 3.402823466E+38F
SMALLINT –32,768 to 32,767
TIME 00:00:00 to 23:59:59
TIMESTAMP Combination of Date and Time limits
TINYINT –128 to 127
VARBINARY 31,995 bytes.
VARCHAR 31,995

The table below lists ABL data types and value limits.

Table 2. ABL data type limits
ABL data type Limit
BLOB 1GB
CHARACTER Constrained by record size.
Note: If a field has more than 32k bytes, you must write your own dump/reload procedure because the OpenEdge dump/reload procedure cannot handle fields larger than 32k bytes.
CLOB 1GB
DATE 1/1/32768 B.C. to 12/31/32767 A.D.
DATE-TIME Same limit as DATE. TIME limit is: 00:00:00 to 23:59:59
DATE-TIME-TZ Same limit as DATE-TIME. Time zone (TZ) limit is:–14:00 to +14:00
DECIMAL 50 digits total; 1 to 10 decimal places
INTEGER –2,147,483,648 to 2,147,483,647
INT64 –9,223,372,036,854,775,808 to 9,223,372,036,854,775,807
LOGICAL TRUE/FALSE, YES/NO
Note: Data columns created using the OpenEdge SQL environment and having a data type that is not supported in an ABL environment are not accessible by ABL applications. Data columns created using an ABL environment can be accessed by OpenEdge SQL applications and utilities. Arrays of data can contain a maximum of 255 elements.

The table below describes data types supported by ABL and their corresponding SQL data types.

Table 3. ABL and SQL data type correspondence
ABL data type OpenEdge SQL data type
CHARACTER VARCHAR
DATE DATE
DECIMAL DECIMAL or NUMERIC
INTEGER INTEGER
INT64 BIGINT
LOGICAL BIT
RAW VARBINARY
RECID INTEGER
DATE-TIME TIMESTAMP