We have a report that has been working. Let me emphasize that: The report has been working correctly for months. But today I started getting:
XQE-PLN-0098 The vendor specific function "Left" is not supported.
Inspecting the report, I find that it is using a data module that uses a couple of packages and a couple of uploaded spreadsheets. It also defines a table based on stuff in one of the packages.
One query uses LEFT() against a SQL Server database. That should work.
One query uses LEFT() against the table (based on SQL Server tables through a package). That may work, but it may be abstracted a step too far and may confuse Cognos.
One query uses LEFT() against a spreadsheet. I would expect that to NOT work. Except Excel has a LEFT() function, so maybe it does.
So, when I started getting the error today, I figured the simple solution would be to replace
LEFT(str, length)
with
SUBSTRING(str, 1, length)
Since SUBSTRING() is in the functions list under Common Function | R-Z, this is a Cognos function, not a vendor specific function, right?
Now I get
XQE-PLN-0098 The vendor specific function "Substring" is not supported.
Ideas?
What could have randomly changed in my environment (no admin action taken) to bork this one report?
Why do I get this error message when Substring is not a vendor specific function?