Thanks for your response, Hilmar! I do understand that there is a Foxpro SELECT command, which differs from an SQL select statment. My confusion is about whether or not I have to use the Foxpro SELECT and what it really does. In my application, I have a form which has 1) a listbox showing a list of names, 2)a textbox for somebody to type in their name. That for also has a Submit button that they press to have their name added to a table(a .dbf file) in some temp directory(on a PC platform running windows2000, foxpro version 8). The init function of the form has only the sql query"
select names from "c:\temp\peoplesnames.dbf" into array nameslist
and then I use additem calls to populate the listbox with nameslist contents.

The click funcion of the submit button contains only these sql statements:
select * from "c:\temp\peoplesnames.dbf" into table "c:\temp\work.dbf"
insert into "c:\temp\work.dbf"(names) values(thisform.nametxtbox.value)
select * from "c:\temp"work.dbf" into table "c:\temp\peoplesnames.dbf"

And this system seems to work just fine. Since I haven't used any foxpro
SELECT 0
USE "c:\temp\whatever table name"
commands, I left to wonder what those commands really do. Do they just establish some alias? or what? Or does my direct usage of the SQL statements implicity execute that which the SELECT 0/USE "tablenames" commands do?
Thanks again, and any insight would be deeply appreciated. Once I get a handle on this I can move onto my more interesting and confusing questions about automatic vs manual record vs table locking! Paul C.