>>Hi all,
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>>we have a file on the customer site that hits the 2gb limit every so often. The dbf and cdx are fine, it is the FTP that hits the limit. when this happens the ftp seems to clear itself out and hold no data. I can restore from a backup and they might lose half a days details, not good but it's something. What gets me is that when I restore from a backup and pack the file the FTP shrinks to 150-180mb. I don't lose any data, there just seems to be huge bloat in the file. I use the insert command to populate the file but it's a log file, it is never updated or modified after the fact. Any ideas what might be causing this?
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>>~M
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>Try setting the blocksize of the fpt file to 0 -- see help
I've not tried this before but have SET BLOCKSIZE on the calling prg so hopefully that helps.
Thanks also for all the other suggestions, the file is constantly in use so packing on a regular basis is not an option, I use INSERT commands to populate the records but never update them so I don't use the replace command on a record in this table. It does need to be a memo field as it holds text of various lengths
A sample of the insert i typically use

* add an entry into QAL table
SELECT QAL
INSERT INTO QAL (QAL_pk, QAL_calnum , QAL_date, QAL_time, QAL_field1, QAL_field2, QAL_reason) ;
	VALUES (mnewpk, mcallnumber, DATE(), TIME(), muserid, "PURCHASE INVOICE", mreason)

Lots of areas update this file, this code comes from the purchase invoice create. QAL_reason is the memo field and will have a note entered in more details, sometimes listing links to file, details about prices, lines of notes that a user enters. In the application there is a tab that shows all of the details pertaining to that call and users can view progress, review problems etc.
~M