Char or Varchar? - You Decide (by John Koziol)

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New to VFP 9 is behavior when a function is used in a SELECT statement that produces a character string. So, for example:

SELECT LEFT(name,10) FROM people

Prior to VFP 9, this would result in the character field “name“.  New to VFP 9 is storing the data to a Varchar field.

Admittedly, this could create some legacy issues, hence, the following new SET:  SET VARCHARMAPPING ON | OFF. If OFF, legacy behavior is unchanged.  When ON, expressions in a SELECT will yield varchar.