Hi Harry.

>> The "object.activecontrol.property" syntax seems to me to be far too limited as it requires you to know exactly what 'parent' object is active before you can reference the object you are really interested in. If you're writing a global handling routine which depends on field types, current content etc, you need something like sys(18) to tell you what variable you are currently playing with, regardless of what form or page or grid or listbox or whatever it may be part of... <<

LOCAL loControl, loColumn
IF TYPE('_Screen.ActiveForm.ActiveControl') = 'O'
   IF _Screen.ActiveControl.BaseClass = 'GRID'
      * Drill Down into the grid to find the Active Cell
      loColumn = _Screen.ActiveForm.ActiveControl.Columns[_Screen.ActiveForm.ActiveControl.ActiveColumn]
      loControl = loColumn.CurrentControl
   ELSE
      loControl = _Screen.ActiveForm.ActiveControl
   ENDIF
ENDIF

This is all untested and written off the top of my head, so you will need to tweak it. But you get the general idea...

Marcia