>>Hi all,
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>>A preferences and practices question.
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>>I have a VFP6 app that I am implementing and maintaining (written by others) that in the course of the user editing records, the developer does a lot of copying the records being updated out to a temp file, processing the edits, appending the records back to the tables, then deleting the original records.
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>>It seems that this would be a performance hit when the edits encompass a lot of records (this is a work order and inventory app), as well as requiring a pack every once in a while. It just seems easier to edit the record directly, but is this possible in a multi-user network app? It is a procedural rather than OOP style app. Looks more FPW2.6 than VFP. I want to know is this the best/preferred way to do this?
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>My days as a developer go back to the early 80s, and I can say I have NEVER handled data this way. I edit a record when it needs editing, and I delete when it needs to be deleted. I never work on a copy of records, delete the originals then append or insert the edited records back into the original table. This is highly inefficient and almost laughable, IMHO.

Have you forgotten dBase III - where you couldn't append to a shared file - i remember writing little exclusive use utilities to do this. Then there was SYS(108) in foxbase that forced the append to shared tables (not sure about FP). But you're almost right - its not almost laughable, it's absolutely laughable. I bet its a trick left over from some single user xbase like dBase II. Now thats what i call extended shelf life!<s>