From: ibisnestremovespambit@iinet.net.au   
      
   Jim Hargan wrote:   
   > Much here that is new to me! Like you, I use a lot of sub-directories for   
   > self-contained child databases -- so everything I use is always aliased,   
   > and therefore ends up hard coded.   
   >   
   > Jim Hargan   
   Hi Jim,   
      
   If you change the working directory to the child database, when you do   
   the linkage of tables for lookups you do not need to use aliases. From   
   then on, Paradox simply assumes that the main table and the lookup table   
     are in the same directory, and does not store the pathway.   
      
   Then you can reset the working directory, and still reference the tables   
   using aliases, with all relationships working correctly.   
      
   If you do use aliases, you can move the database from one system to   
   another provided that you can map the location to the same letter on the   
   new system as on the old. For example, I used to have all my tables   
   nicely set out in directories, heavily cross-referenced with aliases,   
   and all saved in Q:\Database_Directory. So long as I could snaffle the   
   Q:\ mapping there was no problem. But of course, generally this is not   
   acceptable.   
      
   Some years ago I suggested in this forum that (a) aliases were a really   
   great concept, and (b) the way they were turned into hard-coded paths   
   was a really great boo-boo - and got all sorts of strange responses...   
      
   In the Amiga OS (now THERE was a great OS) you could define symbolic   
   paths that all software including SuperBase (quite a good RDBMS) could   
   use - so you could have My_Main_Database and My_Handy_Lookup_Tables and   
   so on configurable. The nearest that M$ OS has are things like   
   MyDocuments and shares - but you really need to be able to define shares   
   within shares.   
      
   It would be handy to have a "directory" / "module" concept in CS   
   databases - that is, be able to put tables into logical groupings within   
   one CS database - maybe already there?   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)