Numeric Fields

Numeric fields have obvious uses, but there are times when numbers should be stored in character fields instead.

A good rule of thumb is to use a numeric field when the resulting numbers will be used in calculations, such as adding two values to get a third value. However, if a number is used as a record identifier, such as a job number, it is generally better to use a character field, for the following reasons:

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When sorting a character field with numbers (assuming your numbers start with 100), you can type "2" to take you to the first group of numbers starting with a 2, such as 200. If you sorted the same field as a numeric, the program would take you to 100.

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A character field allows the additional versatility of using character prefixes or suffixes. For example, if you have jobs 105 and 106, and you want to add an amendment to job 105, you could make it 105-A.

However, sorting numbers in a character field will only work properly if the values are all the same length. For example, 8 9 10 11 would sort with 10 first, since the program uses the first character for the initial sort. Therefore, you have to pad the left of shorter numbers with zeros. For example, 08 09 10 11 will sort as expected.

^•	When sorting a character field with numbers (assuming your numbers start with 100), you can type "2" to take you to the first group of numbers starting with a 2, such as 200. If you sorted the same field as a numeric, the program would take you to 100.
^•	A character field allows the additional versatility of using character prefixes or suffixes. For example, if you have jobs 105 and 106, and you want to add an amendment to job 105, you could make it 105-A.