Comparison of Nonnumeric Operands:
A nonnumeric operand can be compared to the other nonnumeric operand according to the rules as shown below:
(i) Fields of Equal Sizes:
The Characters in the equivalent positions are compared to determine the value of the relational condition. The Comparison begins with the leftmost character in both the fields and proceeds in a left to right side manner. If the 2 characters being compared are found to be unequal at any stage, the field containing the biggest characters is considered to be greater. When the characters are only found to be identical does the comparison proceed to the later position on the right. The 2 fields are taken to be equal only when all these pairs of characters have been found to be similar and the rightmost end has been reached.
(ii) Fields of Unequal Sizes:
If the two operands are not of equivalent size, the shorter field is considered to be extended on the right by spaces to make its size equivalent to the longer field and the rules for comparing fields of equal sizes are used.