>I need to search thru specific fields using wild-cards or regular expressions. For example, I need to have a query like: find all records where
has "12345" ignoring any leading alphabetic characters. Though we all probably know how to do that, VFP won't do that very quickly.
>
>Can anyone recommend a fast text search engine that can handle DBFs and memos and can also do that quickly?
>
>Thanks.
The "$" operator can do this search, but it can't be optimized, and each individual record must be examined. The reason is obviously related to the way VFP manages indices.
There used to be a product called phDBase (I am not sure whether it still exists) that allowed to search for words. It somehow created an index (on separate tables?) for each individual word.
If you want even finer control than full words, you can create this additional index yourself - but the index can quickly get quite huge.
Difference in opinions hath cost many millions of lives: for instance, whether flesh be bread, or bread be flesh; whether whistling be a vice or a virtue; whether it be better to kiss a post, or throw it into the fire... (from Gulliver's Travels)
