>>I have heard that it is not wise to pack a table on a production system, especially when you're dealing with a fairly large table. ( 100,000+ ). Instead you do something like:
>>
>>PARAMETERS tcDbc, tcTableName
>>USE (tcTableName)
>>COPY TO TEMP DATABASE (tcDbc) FOR NOT DELETED()
>>RENAME TEMP.DBF TO &tcTableName..DBF
>>REINDEX
>>* Or recreate the indexes one by one from a data dictionary
>>
>>1. Is the correct syntax.
>>
>>2. If its correct, is there a problem in VFP 5, where the copy to only copies the first 10 characters of field names.
>
>No problem I've ever had. I see a couple things, though:
>
>1) Add WITH CDX to the COPY or you'll lose the indexes
>2) You'll lose some other DB table properties using your technique, if you have them.
>3) You can use SET DELE ON instead of the FOR filter.
>4) the RENAME may be confusing the DBC by putting the new table in a different path, perhaps that's why the 10-char names. Is that possible?
>5) If something goes wrong with this method at runtime , you can be in hot water :) You might want to COPY TO a backup name also, in case...

I forgot to add, upon relection you need to RENAME TABLE also with that method, and that means a REMOVE TABLE also. So the sequence (at least one I've tried before) goes something like:

SET DATA TO etc
SET DELE ON
SELECT old (or USE old in 0)
COPY TO temp DATA etc WITH CDX
RENAME temp TO old && for file
REMOVE TABLE old
RENAME TABLE temp TO old && for DBC