Dragan,

On a similar subject I have been using ALTER TABLE after a SELECT to get rid of columns I don't want. I always wished there was a command like SELECT * EXCEPT Table1.MyField...

Instead of listing each field in the SELECT, I sometimes do

SELECT * FROM orders INNER JOIN ordItems ON orders.order_id=ordItems.order_id INTO CURSOR MyCursor
USE (DBF()) AGAIN IN 0 ALIAS ReadWrite
USE
ALTER TABLE ReadWrite DROP COLUMN order_id_b
ALTER TABLE ReadWrite RENAME COLUMN order_id_a TO order_id

>>>I just found out this works, with a caveat (at least in VFP5). I used a complex SELECT - SQL to generate a report cursor. I wanted to add a memo column to the resultant cursor:

* Report cursor:
>>>SELECT ;
>>>  ... ;
>>>  INTO CURSOR MyCursor ;
>>>  ...
>>>
>>>* Make the cursor read-write:
>>>USE ... AGAIN etc.
>>>
>>>* Add the memo column:
>>>ALTER TABLE ... ADD COLUMN MyMemo M

>>>
>>>BTW can anyone confirm if this works in VFP6?
>>
>>Yep, this still works in VFP6. Now, can someone tell us if it works with VFP7 and just using the READWRITE clause of the SELECT and the ALTER TABLE?
>
>It complained about the table being still open elsewhere - it worked only after I closed the original r/o cursor. Does make sense, that one was read only, and was open in another workarea.
>
>This thing should actually gain us some speed, specially when we had to include dummy fields in a select statements to be placeholders for later additions - we now can do them outside of the SQL statement. What I'm saying is that instead of
>

select ..., space(40) as name, ...

>we can now do the select without this, and add the field afterwards. This should lift some burden off SQL's back.