From 65481c834dca537af5851fa2b7efe209f09af613 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Ben Pfaff Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2017 06:52:53 -0700 Subject: [PATCH] system-file-format: More string fields with null bytes spotted. Manoharan reported that he has also seen system files that contain string fields with compressed null bytes, so reword the description to make this sound less exotic. --- doc/dev/system-file-format.texi | 7 ++++--- 1 file changed, 4 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-) diff --git a/doc/dev/system-file-format.texi b/doc/dev/system-file-format.texi index 484fbb43f1..116fa6f787 100644 --- a/doc/dev/system-file-format.texi +++ b/doc/dev/system-file-format.texi @@ -1572,9 +1572,10 @@ value @var{code} - @var{bias}, where variable @code{bias} from the file header. For example, code 105 with bias 100.0 (the normal value) indicates a numeric variable of value 5. -One file has been seen written by SPSS 14 that contained such a code -in a @emph{string} field with the value 0 (after the bias is -subtracted) as a way of encoding null bytes. + +A code of 0 (after subtracting the bias) in a string field encodes +null bytes. This is unusual, since a string field normally encodes +text data, but it exists in real system files. @item 252 End of file. This code may or may not appear at the end of the data -- 2.30.2