Un-expanding(?) a file

[Nancy Palmquist]

Fredland at aol.com wrote:
> 
> Dear List:
> 
> Back in 1985 or so I did a great deal of programming in filePro for a small
> airline and ever since then one of the vendors has been coming to me whenever
> he has a problem. In this case my memory of fp is not sufficient, but the
> problem may contain elements of general interest so here it is.
> 
> He is running his business on vers. 4.8. He has a file containing both key
> and data segments (very old program) and about 7000 records. It appears that the
> file has acquired about 7000 blank records possibly via Expand Files(?). As a
> result new records are often numbered 14000+. He doesn't want this to be
> happening (it's not a functional problem - he simply doesn't like it like that) so
> he manually moves any such new records down to the 7000 range. He has gotten
> tired of doing this after several years and would like the file "fixed". This
> is the gist of a phone call from him.
> 
> If memory serves (not very well any more) there is a difference between blank
> records and deleted records. I think, but do not know, that he may be able to
> delete his empty blank records with a simple output process and then
> overwrite the expand files limit with a new number in the 7000 range a couple of
> records beyond his active EOF. Once these are used then I would expect the
> automated expand function built into FP to take over. I'm in the midst of a major
> renovation so do not have time to research this and am loath to suggest an
> unverified procedure. Any clarification would be appreciated.
> 
> Fred Mindermann
> fredland at aol.com
> _______________________________________________
> Filepro-list mailing list
> Filepro-list at lists.celestial.com
> http://mailman.celestial.com/mailman/listinfo/filepro-list

The correct solution might be to create a look-a-like file (might be a
good time to put all the fields in the key instead of splitting them.

Then copy all the records from this file to the new file.  You now have
a file with no blank records.

Now this new file will have the creation date, update date and record
numbers different from the original file, if that is ok, that is the
solution.

There is no way to shrink a file in filepro directly.  You have to put
the records somewhere else to make a smaller file.

There is a solution that would retain the @cd and @ud info but with a
key and data segment, it is much more complex.  Since this guy keeps
moving stuff around I would guess he is not interested in that
information.

Nancy
-- 
Nancy Palmquist 
Virtual Software Systems
PHONE: (412) 835-9417			Web site:  http://www.vss3.com