MQ> Really?  If so, then when I change my example to this:
 MQ> TYPE test a as STRING * 10 END TYPE
 MQ> dim b as TEST
You're confusing situations, and forgetting the original post which dealt
with reading other people's data files, such as TP or C which usually
pad strings with nulls in the data file.  Also, you've strangely created
another variable unneccarily to contain the TEST variable, which is
defined in memory (twice) without data filling it.  When the data is
read back, that's different.
Are you catching on now?  Nobody here, not I, is saying that ALL strings
are null padded... but this thread is about the person who posted it
originally reading another data file which did happen to store nulls,
thus your advice was right for YOUR situation but wrong for the other
user's original request.
That's my point, I expressed this in the last correspondence, and you're
somehow trying to form a relationship out of two varying situations.
Nothing personal, no offense intended with my remarks.  I just hope
you understand in the context of the problem posed in this echo, your
results were posted in simple error.
I thank you for writing about YOUR situation.  With that scenario, copying
a dimensioned variable to another creating your own structure, YES,
the default pad character is a space.  I would not recommend you to use
this method in commercial apps you may create, simply because everyone
else does kinda by default in other languages.  The unofficial standard,
based on various BBS structures I've viewed from all over.  You may wish
to null pad, as the user who wrote the original message discovered
the HARD way!
;-) 
Take care, and hope ya take no offense.  I just wanted to clear things up.
-James (SysOp/AD Message System)
--- QuickBBS 2.80 (Zeta-1.9A)
---------------