There are times you want to pass a variable to a SEQUEL view without having the user see or supply the value. For example, you may want to pass the job date or system time into the title of the view, report, or table. SEQUEL includes several special default values for variable passing.
| Keyword | Usage | Length |
|---|---|---|
| *JOBNBR | Retrieve current job number | 6 |
| *JOB | Retrieve current job name | 10 |
| *USER | Retrieve current user name | 10 |
| *JOBDATE | Retrieve current job date | 6 |
| *SYSDATE | Retrieve current system date | 6 |
| *SYSTIME | Retrieve current system time | 6 |
When you use these special values in conjunction with another special value, *NOPROMPT, *NP, or *NOPMT on the “Prompt Text” parameter, SEQUEL passes the value to the view without user intervention.
For example, here is simple prompted view to pass the variable, job date (*JOBDATE), into the title of the view:
On the Variable tab, define the Type as “Date,” the Prompt Text as *NOPROMPT, and the Default as *JOBDATE.
To see the job date value in the title of the results, you must put the variable in the description of the view when you save it.
When you run the view, you won’t be prompted for the date. SEQUEL automatically inserts it into the title.
For a more complete description of the special keywords and *NOPROMPT, refer to the Variable Specification section of the SEQUEL ViewPoint User Guide.