>Another idea instead of FREAD() it's to create a table or cursor with the structure of each of the fields he finds, and then use Append From SDF.
>
Those special characters seem like ACT file pointers

The INCLUDE file is: REM $INCLUDE: 'FIL0100.BI'

When an ACT (or encoded) file is opened, 'FIL0100.BI' filters the pointers and presents only the text data. The file operations are just as they would be for a text file.