PE> I was thinking, you could actually use SQL to read the *.PKT format too,

 PE> couldn't you?  Sure, it's yet another "database" format,
but whether it's

 PE> dBase, Clipper, Jam, Squish, *.MSG, *.PKT, they're all just database

 PE> formats right, and if you want to convert from one to the other, you just

 PE> need to set up the interface to SQL properly, right?  BFN.



Yes, you can consider any file format as a database and write an SQL engine
to retrieve the data.



There's no reason why you couldn't write an SQL engine that knows how to
read and write various formats.



One thing you'll need to take into account: you need some sort of data
dictionary to specify what fields are in the record and where they are. In
SQL you would just say "SELECT NAME, ADDRESS FROM USERS" and it
would figure out where the name and address fields are in the users table.





Paul



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