The recent discussion on sorting brings to mind Dr. Codds dictum in the relational model that entries can be stored in any order -- this greatly simplies design as the recent discussion proves. In the ideal world perhaps IMAGE would return data via a sorted DBGET. As I understand the IMAGE internals, maintaining a sort field has almost no performance impact IF entries are added in sorted order. Is this correct? Given all the programmer time and concern over maintaining a sort order in chains perhaps it would be cost effective and even considered to be good database design practice to declare sort fields when data is added in sort order. -- - Cortlandt Wilson Cortlandt Software (415) 966-8555