The following restrictions and limitations apply to the use of the multilingual support facilities:
- The multilingual facilities can only be activated in partitions that use the SAA/CUA standards option.
- When defining a new partition (or modifying an existing partition) to support multilingual applications a "default" language must be nominated.
- NChar and NVarChar fields are only supported on RDMLX objects in an RDMLX partition. They may not be displayed on *WEBEVENT functions.
- It is virtually impossible to fully develop a DBCS application on a machine that does not have a DBCS primary language and DBCS capable devices attached.
- For applications in bi-directional or DBCS languages you must use multilingual support, regardless of whether or not the resulting applications are truly multilingual (that is, able to operate in more than one language).
The following table indicates dynamic language switching capabilities between the 3 main language groups:
Compiled Language
LRTB
DBCS
RLTB
LRTB
Yes
Yes *2*4
Yes *1
DBCS *2
Yes *3
Yes
Yes *1*3
RLTB
Yes *1
Yes *1*2*4
Yes
* 1 indicates that some screen panels may appear strange in a dynamic switch between the languages. Recompilation would be recommended.
* 2 indicates that the machine must have IBM i or CPF DBCS support for the language being used as a primary or secondary language.
* 3 indicates that the display device should be DBCS capable or the operating system will issue an inquiry message indicating the device is non-DBCS. Recompilation is recommended if non-DBCS capable display devices are to be used.
* 4 indicates that recompilation is recommended if DBCS capable display devices are to be used.
Refer also to Handling Multilingual Text.