my text files are not that big. and filetostr and alines can let me avoid jumping through hoops to und what mainframe guys do (like coding the sign of a number into the penny of a dollar amount), check for valid expressions, etc.
and it is fast.
Peter



>> lcFileContent=FILETOSTR(lcFileName)
>> *remove garbage at start and end
>> x4=AT( lcFirstRecord ,lcFileContent )+2
>< snip >
>
>Aagh...that seems like a lot of code compared to APPEND FROM :)
>Anyway, I guess Chris solved it with John'n method...but I just was curious: have you tried your technique on a typical large import file, of say 50 MB or so? I suspect FILETOSTRING will not always handle that, it being constrained by available memory...and even with loads of memory available, it may choke on performance...