Hi Markus,

>I checked the real test data (500,000 records) for things like these and my sample code does what's necessary but not more.

well, less lines should run faster at least in vfp...

SELECT Table2

SCAN
  lcName = RTRIM( Name )
  lcStrasse = RTRIM( Strasse )
  *
  FPUTS( m.lnFHandle, ;
        STUFF( m.lcName, RAT( " ", m.lcName ), 1, ", " ) +", " ;
      + STUFF( m.lcStrasse, RAT( " ", m.lcStrasse ), 1, ", " ) ;
      + ", " ;
      + StrTran(RTrim(m.lcOrt), " ", ", ", 1, 1) ;
      +", " ;
      + RTRIM( eMail ) )
ENDSCAN

and if the "vorname" has also only blanks at the end,
an analogous approach to PLZ / Ort might give some more speed while eliminating another local var.

And AFAIR there was a faster way than FPUTS to write to disk, but that might have been only in certain data sizes.

regards

thomas