Accessing Data

Lawson recommends that you use the tools provided by Lawson to access Lawson data. This ensures that your data remains accurate and accessible by Lawson programs and utilities. On rare occasions, you might use non-Lawson tools to view or report on your Lawson data. Never update Lawson data using non-Lawson tools. Lawson Software does provide some instructions for accessing the database via non-Lawson tools; however, using third-party products correctly is the responsibility of the user.

Lawson data appears in three different formats, depending on the data access tool you choose:

• Using text editors to view Lawson program source files, you see your data files and fields represented with Lawson COBOL naming conventions.

• Using utilities such as Database Definition (dbdef) or import/export tools (importdb), you see your data files and fields represented in the Lawson 4GL naming conventions.

The following section provides information to help you understand how Lawson has handled naming conventions between these three paradigms. Lawson Implementation of SQL Conventions