The help is so so

• It is difficult to navigate - no previous/next buttons
• Information is hard to find - what is the search order for finding a table? When you select the new Customer application, the table is in the selected directory, but that is not the :work: directory. So how is it done?

Extension	Description
Primary files
db	Table
dbf
fsl	Form
rsl	Report
ssl	Code module - Script
lsl	Code module - Library
Support files
fam
mb
px
tv
val
xg0
ygo

• Table names
• Field names
• Field types
• Unique record ID's
• Links
• Referential integrity
• Locks
• Rollback

• Paradox and MS Access both require that the full product be purchased and installed on each machine that has access to the data.
• Delphi and Visual Basic compile to executables that can be freely distributed (ie, no per seat cost).
• Web-based places either Delphi or Visual Basic (ASP) code on a single machine.

• No spaces in table or field namess

The form - ImprtDoc.FSL - was used to import specially formatted text files.

After a while, it was obvious that this was not such a good idea - identical forms and reports were being replicated all over the hard drive. My solution was to adopt an even more object oriented approach - I placed all the forms and reports in a central location and placed only the tables (including indices and the like, about 15 files in all) with the database it was describing. CM_Data and the methods (forms and reports) were placed in x:\PW_TOOLS\CM_TOOLS, the alias was :CM Tools:.

If all this data had been placed in one humongous table, then the tight association between the data and what it was describing would have been lost. For instance, the object oriented approach causes the associated data to be copied whenever the database is copied (or backed up, or deleted, or renamed). Therefore the actual amout of work necessary to maintain the description data is significantly reduced. Also, the data fields necessary to identify which database a specific record belongs to is replaced with a directory structure.

Many directories contain a CM_Data object (directory) which contains 2 tables - Descript.db and Structs.db. (2 tables require 15 files with indecies, memo tables, validity checks, and the like.)

Instances of the CM_Data object are accessed via

• :CM Tools:PRINTRPT.FSL
• :CM Tools:STRUCTS5.FSL

Descript.db	Description of each object in the directory
Structs.db	Description of each field in a table object

Under MS Access, databases are stored in mdb files, not directories. The CM data should be stored in a separate mdb file

xx.mdb	Primary database
xx_cm.mdb	Database with the associated CM data

However, once again, you need the development system in order to get formatted data from your system. Only compiled applications should be used for forms and reports - neither Paradox nor MS Access should be used.

Active web content is problematic because the "web server" is another runtime environment. ISAPI is a particular problem because there is no simple way to tell the server to unload the dll. You actually have to shutdown the server and restart it. (Unbelievable) Yeh, there are a few workarounds, but they're basically all kludges. This sort of thing should be built into the server.

Modified By contains either a name or "Auto" if it is set by a program.

Right click any item to get a selection menu. - View with data, edit form, resructure table, filter

Exporting Paradox 8 1-to-many reports to html does not include the "many" data; exporting to text does (but the formatting sucks).

On structs5.fsl, right click the File Extension field to select which (or all) extension to display.

URL: http:// cpcug.org / user / clemenzi / technical / Databases / Paradox / index.html