equals - EqualsIgnoreCase function - Exception : org.apache.pig.backend.executionengine.ExecException -

equalsignorecase function - exception : org.apache.pig.backend.executionengine.execexception

input :

 a.csv  -------      (blank/empty line)   b   b   c   c 

objective : select records 'a', 'a', 'b' , 'b'.

approach 1 :

    = load 'a.csv' using pigstorage(',') (value:chararray);     b = filter lower(value) in ('a','b');     dump b;      output :      (a)      (a)      (b)      (b) 

approach 2 :

    c = filter equalsignorecase(value, 'a') or  equalsignorecase(value, 'b');      output :      2015-04-27 23:48:21,958 [thread-30] warn   org.apache.hadoop.mapred.localjobrunner - job_local_0014         org.apache.pig.backend.executionengine.execexception         @ org.apache.pig.builtin.equalsignorecase.exec(equalsignorecase.java:50) 

trying understand why exception getting thrown. understand because of blank record.

tried checking value not being null or empty, still same error.

  d = filter (value not null) or (trim(value) != '') , (equalsignorecase(value, 'a') or  equalsignorecase(value, 'b')); 

any inputs/ thoughts on achieving our objective using approach 2 appreciated.

yes right, string functions equalsignorecase , trim not able handle blank string in input.
solve issue,what ever did in last stmt right, remove trim function work.

c = filter (value not null) , (equalsignorecase(value, 'a') or  equalsignorecase(value, 'b')); 

is not null condition take care of empty(null, space , tab) chars, trim function not required.