Informix Error -2950: The column name has no section which starts at 1. Remember that the first subscript is one, not zero.

Reasons / Common Causes

-2950 fires when a column split across multiple subscripted display fields doesn't cover an unbroken, non-overlapping range starting at position 1 — per the official guidance, either there's no first section (starting from column 1), or one section overlaps another; note that subscripts are 1-based, not 0-based.

1. No subscripted section starting at position 1, per the official guidance — the first named cause.
2. A subscript numbered from 0 instead of 1, per the official guidance — an explicitly called-out variant of the first cause.
3. Overlapping subscripted sections, per the official guidance — the second named cause.

Solutions / Resolution

1. Review the substrings that are specified, per the official guidance, ensuring one section starts at 1 and none overlap.
2. Consider using a multiline edit field instead of a group of substrings, per the official guidance — it's simpler to code and provides better editing for data entry.

Examples

Subscripts starting at 0 instead of 1

ATTRIBUTES
  part1 = notes[0,24];
  part2 = notes[25,49];
-- -2950: subscripts are 1-based; there is no column 0

Corrected

ATTRIBUTES
  part1 = notes[1,25];
  part2 = notes[26,50];

Diagnostic Checks

1. Check that one subscripted section of the column starts at 1, and that no two sections overlap.

Related Errors / Related Topics

• -2930 — "Portions of the column name are displayed on the screen more than once." The general overlapping-subscript error, of which a missing first-section-at-1 is a specific variant.
• -2940 — "The column name appears both with and without subscripts." A related column-subscripting error, about mixing whole and subscripted references rather than omitting the starting section.

A subscripted column display is missing its section starting at 1, or has overlapping sections — remember subscripts start at 1, not 0.