more like a question out of scientific interest than pratical value
In each version it seems that more strict type checks are employed. I
met one condition on 9.2 and now I get another one on 9.3.1

INGRES REPORT Copyright 2009 Ingres Corporation
Reading report specifications and preparing query . . .
E_RW11F7 Arithmetic operands not the same data type and each cannot be
coerced to the data type of the other in header text for 'detail'.
Line with
error: 'let h_timh_xrewshs=timh_symb*(100.0+pt_fpa)/periektiko/
100.0'.
Processing continues . . .

E_RW100A 1 error(s) have occurred in setting up the report. No report
will
be written. Correct errors and rerun.

first of all hats off to the one who though of this error description!
it is really well set.
the issue is that the types of pt_fpa,timh_symb,periektiko are not
known until run time
since they come from the database being read from a select query :

select timh_symb = y.timh_symb, pt_fpa = y.pt_fpa,
periektiko = y.periektiko,

hence their types :

timh_symb decimal 16,4
periektiko integer 4
pt_fpa float

cannot be checked at compile time and that is why I get a runtime
error


'pt_fpa' has a float data type (it is not a scientific domain
application, but probably the type was chosen like that in the pre-
decimal era) ,
'timh_symb' has a decimal type and seems that a float cannot be
converted to a decimal implicitly, although it could in previous
versions

then trying to convert the float to decimal by :
timh_symb*(100.0+decimal(pt_fpa,16,4))/periektiko/100.0

gives :

INGRES REPORT Copyright 2009 Ingres Corporation
Reading report specifications and preparing query . . .
E_RW107E Too many arguments for function call or no closing
parenthesis in
header text for 'detail'. Line with error: 'let
h_timh_xrewshs=timh_symb*(100.0+decimal(pt_fpa,16, 4))/periektiko/
100.0'.
Error check continues . . .

E_RW100A 1 error(s) have occurred in setting up the report. No report
will
be written. Correct errors and rerun.


the solution was to assign the pt_fpa field to a variable of decimal
type and use that instead :
h_pt_fpa = decimal(16,4) not null

..let h_pt_fpa=pt_fpa
..let h_timh_xrewshs = timh_symb * (100.0 + h_pt_fpa) / periektiko /
100.0

which made the report run successfully

so why the design decision to have more strict type checking as each
version comes out?

This sounds like a bug as it should be possible to coerce a float into
decimal and vice versa.
Have you tested with version 10 yet?


--
Bodo

On Apr 7, 10:01*am, Ingres Forums <info-
ing... (AT) kettleriverconsulting (DOT) com> wrote:
unfortunately I have no version 10 installation

I just saw that this is actually not an error from the DBMS but from the
Report Writer, so this is probably rather a limitation of the Report
Writer here.
It works when doing the calculation as SELECT statement with 9.2.


--
Bodo

On Apr 7, 2:00*pm, Ingres Forums <info-
ing... (AT) kettleriverconsulting (DOT) com> wrote:
I see.thanks for looking it up