>I hazard that many many people expected that a PACK would PACK - i.e. copy the
>table, REINDEX it, and 'optimized' the FPT. I bet many "file maintenance"
>routines are based pricisely on this.

<*shrug*> And I'll bet precisely the other way: that anyone who wants their tables reindexed will explicitly call either REINDEX or DELETE TAG ALL/INDEX ON. I don't see any need to read more into Permanently removes all records marked for deletion in the current table and reduces the size of a memo file associated with the table than is stated.