>I found the problem...It seems that SQL truncates fieldnames to a length of 10 characters. I had some fields longer than that so on update, it did not match.
>

You can avoid that if you do the SQL INTO CURSOR etc NOFILTER, that'll keep the long names...

>I've never used views but I think I ought to get round to it eh?

Yes, I highly recommend it, and buffering in general. After a little learning curve, you will have much more flexibilty than the old scatter/gather method.

And also, other programmers won't grin and say 'Oh, still using that old technique, eh?" < s >