Regression test, NEWS

Author: MichaelChirico

NEWS.md

@@ -373,6 +373,8 @@ See [#2611](https://github.com/Rdatatable/data.table/issues/2611) for details. T
 
 7. In rare situations a data.table object may lose its internal attribute that holds a self-reference. New helper function `.selfref.ok()` tests just that. It is only intended for technical use cases. See manual for examples.
 
+8. Retain important information in the error message about the source of the error when `i=` fails, e.g. pointing to `charToDate()` failing in `DT[date_col == "20250101"]`, [#7444](https://github.com/Rdatatable/data.table/issues/7444). Thanks @jan-swissre for the report and @MichaelChirico for the fix.
+
 ## data.table [v1.17.8](https://github.com/Rdatatable/data.table/milestone/41) (6 July 2025)
 
 1. Internal functions used to signal errors are now marked as non-returning, silencing a compiler warning about potentially unchecked allocation failure. Thanks to Prof. Brian D. Ripley for the report and @aitap for the fix, [#7070](https://github.com/Rdatatable/data.table/pull/7070).

inst/tests/tests.Rraw

@@ -21866,3 +21866,8 @@ text = paste0(
  strrep("a", 500), "\n", "a"
 )
 test(2346, data.table::fread(text = text), data.table(mary = rep("mary", 99), had = "had", a = "a", little = "little", lamb = "lamb"), warning = "First discarded non-empty line")
+
+# .checkTypos internal implementation not exposed for non-typo bug, #7444
+DT = data.table(a = as.Date("2010-01-01"), b = 1L)
+test(2347.1, tryCatch(DT[a == as.Date("20100101")], error=conditionCall)[[1L]], quote(charToDate))
+test(2347.2, tryCatch(DT[a == as.Date("20100101") | b == 2L], error=conditionCall)[[1L]], quote(charToDate))