>I need to add extra formatting text between fields and dependent on field contents. So simple COPY will not work. Do you think using SET TEXTMERGE TO VARIABLE will be faster?
>
>Thanks,
>
Yes, all functions directly writing to a file will be faster than concatenating strings. Same problem as in .NET (and that's why using string builder is recommended approach).

Alternatively you can do this with API string and memory functions - I do recall an interesting discussion on this topic on Russian web-site - may try to find later on.