Chapter 2 Flagging Non-Standard SQL with the FIPS Flagger

The United States government has adopted ANSI X3.135-1989, Database Language SQL, as the database language to be used by all federal departments and agencies. This SQL standard, known as Federal Information Processing Standard 127.1 (FIPS 127.1), requires that all syntax and processing that does not conform to the standard be flagged. In general, flagging provides a means of identifying SQL elements that may have to be modified if an application is to be moved from a nonconforming to a conforming SQL processing environment. And it aids in writing code that is portable between various SQL databases (such as tools code).

ALLBASE/SQL provides a FIPS flagger option for use when preprocessing. Refer to the appropriate preprocessing mode, presented earlier in this chapter, for FIPS flagger syntax. This section documents non-conformant features specific to embedded SQL programming. In addition, the "Standards Flagging Support" appendix in the ALLBASE/SQL Reference Manual lists non-conformant syntax and features, and the ALLBASE/ISQL Reference Manual discusses setting the FIPS flagger in ISQL. The following topics are presented here: