LIKE -- Present on part of a value
To select character or graphic data when you only know part of
a value, use LIKE plus a symbol for the unknown data.
- An underscore (_) is the symbol for any single character. Use
more than one underscore in succession to represent an exact number
of missing characters in their specific location.
- A percent sign (%) is the symbol for any number of characters,
or none.
You can use both symbols in the same value.
You can only use LIKE with character or graphic data.
- For character data, you must always enclose the value after LIKE in single quotation marks. (z/OS and OS/390 requires single
quotation marks around an all-digit value of character data.)
- For graphic data, you must always precede the value after LIKE by the single-byte character "G."
