Cetin/Sergey. Infact, you are right Cetin in that for what I want, the set nulldisplay='' does the trick. As far I can see, the fields can be edited as normal. I guess to appease the user, I could add a 'memo' to memo fields. Thanks to both of you for all the advice (again), all of which will no doubt come in handy anon. This whole business has got me thinking about null fields - even the the good old empty 'memo' tucked in there. Denis