Hi Helen

At 03:13 pm 20/04/2004, you wrote:

>Structurally, it's a little like structured Pascal and a little like
>BASIC. It's really just a very simple structured language and you're
>really beyond expectations if you want SQL to work as a scripting language
>like VFP does.

I guess I was, but that picture seem to be clearing.

>Rather than try to "translate" your VFP, get acquainted with what you *can*
>do with PSQL and standard SQL. Get hold of the IB 6 beta Language
>Reference (LangRef.pdf) and get your head around the language elements you
>have to work with.

I will google for that file, thanks.

>Scan through the *.SQL files in your Firebird \UDF directory ... trickier
>string manipulations.

Okay.

>Understand the difference between DDL (data definition language) and DML
>(data manipulation language). ...

Yes that was what I was not knowing of, thanks for the explanation.

>However, in 1.5, once you actually understand SQL in general, you can use
>the EXECUTE STATEMENT syntax . Then you will be able to construct
>"macro-like" procedures that can be called by other procedures, if there is
>any benefit to that.

Yes, Dorin gave a fine example just recently and that is what I was looking
for.

>You reject the option to write your own external procedures (UDFs). Is
>that because you don't know any languages other than VFP?

In a way yes. COBOL, C, broken PASCAL (due to working with InnoScript but
nothing more serious) is what I know.

>or that you
>don't know how to write dynamic libraries?

In VFP, no I haven't got around to trying <sheepish grin>

>If you do know any programming
>languages, there are HowTo's around to help you to understand how to write
>external functions...

Okay, thanks, but frankly I hadn't known of the difference between UDF and
SP in FireBird the first time round and nor was I aware of the diff.
between DML and DDL, sorry I haven't had much exposure.


Regards
Bhavbhuti
___________________________________________
Softwares for Indian Businesses at:
http://venussoftop.tripod.com
namitbn@...
___________________________________________

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