very simple code

THISFORM.REFRESH
THISFORM.OPLIST.SETFOCUS()
THISFORM.OPERATOR=THISFORM.OPLIST.VALUE

but it doesn't stop at the OPLIST combobox to give the user a chance to pick a value

the debugger shows it going to the gotfocus but it doesn't appear to do the default (which would cause it to popdown)
nor does it do the valid (which would return .f. if the value is empty which it would be if nothing is selected because I've initialised the value to empty to try to resolve this problem)

it just goes oplist.setfocus, gotfocus and straight onto the next line of code...

all clues gratefully received.

Harry