Question

Two datasets are merged, but product IDs do not match.

Dataset A stores IDs as “00125”
Dataset B stores IDs as 125
Merging fails because the IDs appear different


What is the best fix?





Group of answer choices

Apply TRIM to remove whitespace

Delete leading zeros to match the shorter dataset

Convert both columns to numeric values

Use typecasting to convert both to text (string format) with consistent formatting

Answer 1

Use typecasting to convert both to text (string format) with consistent formatting.

Rationale: product IDs are identifiers (not quantities) and often rely on leading zeros, so you should compare them as strings in the same format. Convert the numeric column to text and pad/format it to match the "00125" style (or convert the other to plain "125" only if you’re sure leading zeros are meaningless). TRIM and deleting zeros are wrong here; converting both to numeric would drop meaningful leading zeros.