ABAP Keyword Documentation →  ABAP - Release-Specific Changes →  Changes in Release 3.0 

Internationalization in Release 3.0

1. SORT ... AS TEXT: Locale-specific sorting

2. CONVERT TEXT: Conversion of texts to a
locale-specific format

3. SET LOCALE: Explicit setting of the text environment

Other versions: 7.31 | 7.40 | 7.54

Overview

Since Releases 2.1/2.2, ABAP has provided a number of statements to support the internationalization of programs. USING SET COUNTRY, you can define the date and number formatting for a particular country, while SET LANGUAGE allows you to change the text pool language. TRANSLATE f TO LOWER/UPPER CASE reacts to the locale category LC_CTYPE, and when passing data between application servers and front ends and when passing data using RFC, the system respects the SAP code page.

In Release 3.0, you can sort texts according to the locale (specific to culture). Here, the sort order is determined by the locale category LC_COLLATE.

In addition, the text environment which (among other things) defines the locale-specific sort formulae is set automatically according to the language of the active user when an internal session is opened.

Finally, the basis for internationalization has been modified. Using the SAP text environment table TCP0C, text environments are assigned to a four-part key consisting of <PLATFORM, LANGUAGE, COUNTRY, MODIFIER>.

Modification 1

SORT ... AS TEXT: Locale-specific sorting

The addition ... AS TEXT of the language element SORT enables text data to be sorted specific to the locale.

Modification 2

CONVERT TEXT: Conversion of texts to a locale-specific sortable format

The new CONVERT variant CONVERT TEXT t INTO SORTABLE CODE sc converts a text to a locale-specific sortable format.

Modification 3

SET LOCALE: Explicit setting of the text environment

The new SET variant SET LOCALE enables program-driven configuration of the text environment.