Character strings are compared according to the HP eight-bit ASCII
collating sequence for ASCII data, or the collation rules for the
native language of the DBEnvironment for NLS data. Column data would
either be ASCII data or NLS data depending on how the column
was declared upon its creation. Constants are ASCII data or NLS data
depending on whether you are using NLS or not.
If a case insensitive ASCII expression is compared to a case insensitive NLS
expression, the two expressions are compared using the NLS collation rules.
The case insensitive NLS comparison is done by using the NLSCANMOVE and
NLSCOLLATE intrinsics. The same ASCII characters in upper and lower case are
equivalent. Accent characters (extended character) in upper and lower case
are also equivalent. However, an accent character may not be the same as its
ASCII equivalent, depending on the specific language collation table.
Extended upper and lower case characters are not equivalent to the
ASCII expression. They are compared to the NLS collation table.
If a case sensitive character column is compared to a character column
that is not case sensitive, both columns are treated as case sensitive.
If a string constant is compared to a column that is not case
sensitive, then the string constant is treated as not case sensitive.