>>Given:
>> parent table w/ id & status fields.
>> child table w/ parents id & its own status field.
>> status is some value between 1 and 9.
>>
>>If I change the status of one of the children I want to update the parent
>with the least value of all of its children.
>>
>>So with both childrens' status = 3 parents status will be 3, but if child
>#1 status changes to 1 i want parents' status to = 1.
>>
>>update procedure on the child table:
>>
>>PROCEDURE _child_Update
>>LOCAL lcItem, lcStatus, lcOldError, llError
>>lcItem=child.itemid
>>lcStatus=child.status
>>lcOldError=ON("ERROR")
>>ON ERROR llError=.T.
>>llError=.F.
>>SELECT child && is this legal in trigger?
>>SCAN FOR child.itemid = lcItem
>> IF status < lcStatus
>> lcStatus = status
>> ENDIF
>>ENDSCAN
>>BEGIN TRANSACTION

why not
lcAlias = alias()
select * from child into cursor temp order by status
go top
lcStatus = temp.status
use in temp
select &lcAlias
begin transaction