At 01:43 PM 30/08/2006, you wrote:

> I didn't realize the placment of the user and login was
>so strict. I thought once I specifed my user and password,
>I would be set to connect to any DB I owned.

Aaah, such confusion! <g>

isql is simply a client application that gives you an interface to
pass SQL statements in one way or another. When connecting to a
database (via isql or any other client application) you have to
supply user name and password.

With isql you can do this one of two ways, either:

1) by passing the username and password as switches when you invoke
isql from the command line, e.g.

isql -user sysdba -password masterkey

or
2) as arguments of the SQL statements CONNECT or CREATE DATABASE, as
you now have done, thanks to Alan's advice

There is no command in SQL (or isql) like "user" or "password", as
you initially tried to do.

For 1), if you have the system variables isc_user and isc_password
available in your user scope, you can omit the switches and isql will
apply them itself.

For 2), of course you have to comply with SQL syntax and use the
actual SQL keywords USER and PASSWORD, and single-quote the strings.

If you started isql with 1), you then don't need to supply the
arguments to the CONNECT or CREATE DATABASE statements.

./heLen