Controls the following settings:

    o  Whether the length of character string parameters, columns,
       and domains are interpreted as characters or octets

    o  Whether double quotation marks are interpreted as string
       literals or delimited identifiers

    o  Whether or not identifiers can be keywords

    o  Which views are read-only

    o  Whether columns with the DATE or CURRENT_TIMESTAMP data type
       are interpreted as VMS or SQL99 format

    The DIALECT clause lets you specify the settings with one clause,
    instead of specifying each setting individually. Because the
    module processor processes the module clauses sequentially, the
    DIALECT clause can override the settings of clauses specified
    before it or be overridden by clauses specified after it.

    The following statements are specific to the SQL99 dialect:

    o  The default constraint evaluation time setting changes from
       DEFERRABLE to NOT DEFERRABLE.

    o  Conversions between character data types when storing data or
       retrieving data will raise exceptions or warnings in certain
       situations.

    o  You can specify DECIMAL or NUMERIC for formal parameters
       in SQL modules, and declare host language parameters with
       packed decimal or signed numeric storage format. SQL generates
       an error message if you attempt to exceed the precision
       specified.

    o  The USER keyword specifies the current active user name for a
       request.

    o  A warning is generated when a NULL value is eliminated from a
       SET function.

    o  The WITH CHECK OPTION clause on views returns a discrete error
       code from an integrity constraint failure.

    o  An exception is generated with non-null terminated C strings.

    See the SET_DIALECT statement for more information about
    dialects.