If you can add 'X' to your ref_Table than following should work.

SELECT;
 Work_Table.Code, MAX(Ref_Table.Code) as max_code;
 FROM Work_Table ;
 JOIN Ref_Table ;
 ON Work_Table.Code = STRTRAN(Ref_Table.Code, " ", "") ;
 	OR "X" = STRTRAN(Ref_Table.Code, " ", "") ;
 GROUP BY 1 ;
 INTO CURSOR temp1

I'll look into the rest of your post later.


>Hi Sergey,
>I've used this to step thing.
>But after a while a remembered that I need to set the ones not referenced in the table with the max() to a default value.
>
>I in my stupidity remebered on OUTER JOIN condition and NVL() doing something like
>

>*Say 'X' is a default
>
>SELECT;
> Work_Table.Code, <b>NVL(</b>MAX(Ref_Table.Code)<b>,'X')</b> as max_code;
> FROM Work_Table ;
> <b>LEFT OUTER</b> JOIN Ref_Table ;
> ON Work_Table.Code = STRTRAN(Ref_Table.Code, " ", "") ;
> GROUP BY 1 ;
> INTO CURSOR temp1
>

>This gives me the pour nonsense.
>
< snip >