Here's the description for this property from the spec, including a change for errata 2.100. I am concerned about the red sentence about length units. textOutputMinLength Non-negative Integer. Only used when dfdl:textPadKind is 'padChar' and dfdl:lengthKind is 'delimited', 'prefixed', 'pattern' or 'endOfParent' or 'explicit' and dfdl:length is an expression, and type is not xs:string Specifies the minimum representation length during unparsing for simple types that do not allow the xs:minlength facet to be specified. The units are specified by the dfdl:lengthUnits property. If dfdl:textOutputMinLength is zero or less than the length of the representation text then no padding occurs. Annotation: dfdl:element, dfdl:simpleType However, when parsing, dfdl:lengthUnits is only used for a 'specified length' so that's dfdl:lengthKind 'explicit', 'implicit' and 'prefixed'. When 'delimited', 'pattern' or 'endOfParent' dfdl:lengthUnits is not used. I think we should be saying: "For dfdl:lengthKind 'delimited', 'pattern' and 'endOfParent' the length units are characters. For other dfdl:lengthKinds the length units are specified by the dfdl:lengthUnits property." Same argument applies to XSD minLength facet for xs:strings. Regards Steve Hanson Architect, Data Format Description Language (DFDL) Co-Chair, OGF DFDL Working Group IBM SWG, Hursley, UK smh@uk.ibm.com tel:+44-1962-815848 Unless stated otherwise above: IBM United Kingdom Limited - Registered in England and Wales with number 741598. Registered office: PO Box 41, North Harbour, Portsmouth, Hampshire PO6 3AU