I was the one who originally suggested doing it in a stored procedure, but you pointed out the problem with trying to pack your own DBC. I don't think anyone suggested using a 2nd DBC.

Of course, he may not be allowed to do this, since that would be VFP code.

>Steve,
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>>I really like your idea...
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>COM can be useful once in a while! *wink*
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>>Perhaps (like you say) you can't do this with the runtime. If that is true, it won't work unless VFP is actually installed on his target machine.
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>True...does make it harder to deploy...
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>>I have another thought (untested, of course). What if there was a second DBC, with a stored procedure in it? Would that stored procedure be able to open another DBC and pack it? Perhaps it could do the process manually (opening the DBC as a table, and packing it).
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>I don't see why that wouldn't work...as long as the database doing the PACK knows where to find the second DBC, all should go fine... I tohught someone already brought up this idea, though, no? I can't remember all that has been suggested...
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>JoeK