>>Is this QBE?
>>
>>If so, what you have is the simpliest approach. The only danger is in the fact that you've exposed your database schema to application. Maybe even hardcoded things like table and column names, data types, and relationships?
>>
>>-Mike
>
>
>The field names are part of a Dictionary (SQL table). So are the table names and their relationships. VFP is used as a presentation layer only, calling stored procs. for the rest.
>
>Optimizing these queries however is another undertaking. I basically have two types of fiels:
>a) single value fields (like: A, D, F, etc.) which are indexed and perform well.
>b) multi-value Yes/No fields coded as binary numbers: 0010010010. The only way to extract the values is using: SUBSTRING(field, loc, 1) = '1'. Obviously indexing does not help here. These queries take long to execute. I tried converting the binary numbers to decimals and then somehow query numeric ranges, but I saw no improvement. I have fields that are 80 chars long, so they cannot be converted to numeric values either. Any other suggestions?

You can query multi-value character fields using LIKE operator.

-- field '0010010010'
...
   WHERE myfield LIKE '1?1????????'
-- or
   WHERE myfield LIKE '1?1%'

It'll make query simpplier but wouldn't speed it up in most cases.