Data conversion with the UNLOAD utility

For example, you can convert columns of a numeric type (SMALLINT, INTEGER, FLOAT, DOUBLE, REAL, and DECIMAL) from the DB2® internal format to the S/390® or an external format.

When you unload a floating-point type column, you can specify the binary form of the output to either the S/390 format (hexadecimal floating point, or HFP), or the IEEE format (binary floating point, or BFP).

You can also convert a varying-length column to a fixed-length output field, with or without padding characters. In either case, unless you explicitly specify a fixed-length data type for the field, the data itself is treated as a varying-length data, and a length field is appended to the data.

For certain data types, you can unload data into fields with a smaller length by using the TRUNCATE or STRIP options. In this situation, if a character code conversion is applied, the length of the data in bytes might change due to the code conversion. The truncation operation is applied after the code conversion.

You can perform character code conversion on a character type field, including converting numeric columns to the external format and the CLOB type. Be aware that when you apply a character code conversion for mixed-data fields, the length of the result string in bytes can be shorter or longer than the length of the source string. Character type data is always converted if you specify any of the character code conversion options (EBCDIC, ASCII, UNICODE, or CCSID).

DATE, TIME, or TIMESTAMP column types are always converted into the external formats based on the DATE, TIME, and TIMESTAMP formats of your installation.