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 Procedural SQL (PSQL) StatementsAggregate Functions 

CHAR_LENGTH(), CHARACTER_LENGTH()

String length in characters

Result type

INTEGER, or BIGINT for BLOB

Syntax
  CHAR_LENGTH (string)
| CHARACTER_LENGTH (string)
Table 1. CHAR[ACTER]_LENGTH Function Parameter
Parameter Description

string

An expression of a string type

Gives the length in characters of the input string.

Note

  • With arguments of type CHAR, this function returns the formal string length (i.e. the declared length of a field or variable).If you want to obtain the “logical” length, not counting the trailing spaces, right-TRIM the argument before passing it to CHAR[ACTER]_LENGTH.

  • This function fully supports text BLOBs of any length and character set.

CHAR_LENGTH Examples

select char_length('Hello!') from rdb$database
-- returns 6

select char_length(_iso8859_1 'Grüß di!') from rdb$database
-- returns 8

select char_length
  (cast (_iso8859_1 'Grüß di!' as varchar(24) character set utf8))
from rdb$database
-- returns 8; the fact that ü and ß take up two bytes each is irrelevant

select char_length
  (cast (_iso8859_1 'Grüß di!' as char(24) character set utf8))
from rdb$database
-- returns 24: all 24 CHAR positions count
See also

[fblangref50-scalarfuncs-bit-length], [fblangref50-scalarfuncs-octet-length]