>I don't quite understand what these are for. On a multi-user app I would like a user to have the ability to query the entire database without the danger of opening files temporarily locked by other users - can I give the user a private data session which in effect gives him/her their own copy of the database to query? Is this what this is for?

You can do what you want using the initial default datasession. If another user has tables opened on another workstation and he/she has locks, then you can not lock those particular records or files (depending on the type of lock).

If you only want to view/query the data then open the tables SHARED and go for it.

Private Datasessions are used more for a multi-tasking like environment. Let's say you are running a help desk application. You have three people on hold and you need to access each person's account. You could bring up the end-user form 3 times (using private datasessions) and view/update each person's account without harming the other forms data.

Private datasessions give you the ability to open and manipulate data, record pointer position, etc. without effecting anything in any other datasessions. Without this ablity, all tasks would be synchronous. You would have to complete the update of End User 1 before proceeding top End User 2 and so on.

I hope this helped alittle.