>>>We have a list of file names in a table and are attempting to append the AutoCad DWG files into the corresponding general field. The problem is that the append general command opens AutCad for every file in the list. After about 20 copies of AutoCad being opened, the machines grinds to a halt...
>>>
>>>How can we append an AutoCad picture to a general field without AutoCad being opened?
>>>
>>
>>You can't - by the nature of a General field, it fire the OLE server application each and every time you manipulate the General field's content. The solution is to use a binary memo field to hold the data, and extract it when you need it, putting it back into the memo field when you're finished manipulating it, or deleting the extracted file if no changes were made.
>
>The reason we wanted to use the general field is that..
>.. one user (the cad operator) could add the drawing to the data
>.. while others, without AutoCad on their machine, could produce a report containing those pictures.
>
>Is this still possible with the binary memo approach? How would I load the file into the memo - would this be a FileToStr() type operation? Are there any alternative approaches of getting a DWG onto a report that your aware of?

You'd move them either using FileToStr() and StrToFile(), or with APPEND MEMO/COPY MEMO. Since you could create instances of the file with unique names, several people could run AutoCAD against the content at once. And you're going to have to install AutoCAD on each system to print IAC - the General field relies on an OLE Server application, in this case AutoCAD, to handle the contents, including printing them, so you still need it on each station to deal with the .DWG files, unless you have another application that can handle .DWG files for you. There's no native OLE Server for .DWG other than AutoCAD that I'm aware of, at least there isn't a native one provided with Win98, WinNT or Win2K.