@ Cannot Be Used As a Delimiter with the APPEND Command

ID: Q115109

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft FoxPro for Windows, versions 2.5, 2.5a, 2.5b, 2.6
Microsoft FoxPro for MS-DOS, versions 2.5, 2.5a, 2.5b, 2.6
Microsoft FoxPro for Macintosh, versions 2.5b, 2.5c

SUMMARY

The at sign ("@") cannot be used as a delimiter in FoxPro versions 2.5 and 2.6 for MS-DOS and Windows when you are using the APPEND command to append information from an ASCII text file.

MORE INFORMATION

A number of UNIX-based products such as EMPRESS generate ASCII files using @ signs as delimiters. The following is an example of an ASCII file generated by EMPRESS version 6.0 running on a Sun Microsystems SPARC workstation:

   704@575@1111@JOHN B SMITH
   704@575@1122@FRANKLIN T WOND
   704@575@1133@ALICIA J ZELAYA

However, when you use @ as a delimiter with the APPEND command, as in the following example

   APPEND FROM <Text_Filename> DELIMITED WITH @

(where the <Text_Filename> is the name of the ASCII file), FoxPro will not recognize the @ sign as a delimiter and will try to include each record from the ASCII file in the first field of the FoxPro .DBF file.

To correct this problem:

1. In the Command window, type the following to open the text file:

      MODIFY FILE <Text_Filename>

2. From the Edit menu, choose Find.

3. Type "@" (without the quotation marks) in the Look For text box, and

   type "," (without the quotation marks) in the Replace With text box.
   Then choose Replace All.

4. Save the file, and then use the following APPEND statement:

      APPEND FROM <Text_Filename> DELIMITED WITH ,

Additional reference words: FoxMac FoxDos FoxWin 2.50 2.50a 2.50b 2.60 2.50c KBCategory: kbprg KBSubcategory: FxprgGeneral

Last Reviewed: June 27, 1995