VA FileMan Programmer Manual: $$HTML^DILF()

Contents:

Main

Database Server (DBS) API

$$HTML^DILF(): HTML Encoder/Decoder

Reference Type	Category	ICR #
Supported	Database Server (DBS)	2054

Description

The $$HTML^DILF extrinsic function has two capabilities:

Encodes a string that can contain embedded caret (^) characters according to the rules of HTML so that the ^ characters are replaced with the following string:
```
   &#94;
```
As a side effect, & characters are encoded as the following string:
```
   &amp;
```
Other encodings typical of HTML are not performed by this function, since its focus is on encoding the ^ character used as the delimiter in VA FileMan databases.
Decodes an encoded string, restoring its ^ and & characters.

Format

$$HTML^DILF(string[,action])

Input Parameters

string

(Required) The string to be either encoded or decoded. Encoding a string that contains no ^ or & characters has no effect on the string. Nor does decoding one that lacks ^ and & substrings.

action

(Optional) Set this parameter to the following:

1 (default)—Encode the input string.
-1—Decode the input string.

Defaults to 1.

Output

The function evaluates to the encoded or decoded string. If encoding the string makes it overflow the string length limit, it returns error 207. Decoding never makes it overflow.

Error Codes Returned

Table 63 lists the possible error codes returned with the $$HTML^DILF API:

Table 63: $$HTML^DILF—Error Codes Returned

Code	Description
207	The value is too long to encode into HTML.

Reviewed/Updated: May 2026