What is the "Internal Length" in table ?

[yalcin_mete]

Hi,

1 (output length) : I know that this column is the field data type, the maximum the user can enter. But,

What is "internal length"? What is it used for?

Thanks.

data-type.pngtableview.png

[DominikTylczyn]

Hello yalcin.mete

AFAIK:

• output length - how many characters are displayed
• internal length - how many bytes are stored

An internal length will almost always be double of the output length in Unicode systems.

Internal length for date fields is 16, even though the output length is 10. That is due to the fact that date fields are stored internally in YYYYMMDD format, i.e. 8 chars, that take 16 bytes in a Unicode system.

Best regards

Dominik Tylczynski

[Sandra_Rossi]

Why asking "in table"? (it's field related, it's not reserved to tables)

It's related to the External and Internal Formats (display/print versus database), see standard documentation about e.g.

• Screen Fields ABAP Keyword Documentation (sap.com)
• Conversion Routines ABAP Keyword Documentation (sap.com)
• WRITE TO ABAP Keyword Documentation (sap.com)

[yalcin_mete]

I'm sorry. I'll be more careful next time.