>>-REAL--(--numeric-expression--)------------------------------><
The schema is SYSIBM.
The REAL function returns a single-precision floating-point representation of a number.
The argument is an expression that returns a value of any built-in numeric data type.
The result of the function is a single-precision floating-point number. If the argument can be null, the result can be null; if the argument is null, the result is the null value.
The result is the same number that would occur if the argument were assigned to a single-precision floating-point column or variable.
Example:
Using the EMPLOYEE table, find the ratio of salary to commission for employees whose commission is not zero. The columns involved (SALARY and COMM) have DECIMAL data types. The result is desired in single-precision floating point. Therefore, REAL is applied to SALARY so that the division is carried out in floating point (actually double precision) and then REAL is applied to the complete expression to return the result in single-precision floating point.
SELECT EMPNO, REAL(REAL(SALARY)/COMM)
FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE COMM > 0