To define a file

File name.

A file name must start with an alphabetical character and can be up to ten alphanumeric characters. You cannot use hyphens or COBOL reserve words in a file name. For information on COBOL reserve words, see your COBOL documentation.

Whether change tracking is turned ON or OFF, and if ON, what types of changing tracking are turned on.

If you are creating a new file, you must define and save the file before you can turn change tracking on. You cannot turn change tracking on if the maximum number of indexes already exists (16), if the maximum number of primary index fields already exists (13), or if the cumulative size of the primary index fields would exceed maximum of 210 if the change tracking field were added.

After you make changes to this field, you must run blddbdict and dbreorg.

The valid values are:

• OFF - No change tracking (this is the default).

• ON - Change tracking is on for the file, with the exception of deletes and non-Lawson updates (such as ones for Landmark). A physical index instead of a virtual index is used for change tracking.

• ON w/ Deletes - Change tracking is on, including for deletes. Deleted values are flagged as deleted but not physically deleted.

• ON w/ non-Lawson - Change tracking is on, including for non-Lawson updates.

• ON w/Dlts & non-Law - Change tracking is on, including for deletes and non-Lawson updates.

• ON w/ Virtual Index - Change tracking is on, and a virtual index is created instead of a physical index. A virtual index results in slower access to change tracking data but faster day-to-day performance.

• ON w/ Vir Ind & Dlts - Change tracking is on, including for deletes, and a virtual index is used.

• ON w/ Vir Ind & non-Law - Change tracking is on, including for non-Lawson updates, and a virtual index is used.

• ON w/ Vir Ind & Dlts & non-Law - Change tracking is on, including for deletes and non-Lawson updates, and a virtual index is used.

You can view the change tracking results by using database queries on a new timestamp field for the file or table. The name of the field is <DBfileprefix>-CH-STAMP .

You can also set up change tracking through the ctmaint utility.

This flag enables you to create indexes that include a key field that is a unique identifier (across a Lawson environment) for each record. When an index includes the Unique I D field as a key, then the values for other key fields can be duplicates. For example, if you have an index where the key fields are Unique I D, Lastname, and Firstname, then for multiple records the Unique I D field would always contain a unique value, but the Lastname and Firstname fields could all be Smith and John, respectively.

If Yes, a Unique I D field is added at the top of the file field list. You cannot modify this field. In addition, an index with the name PrefixUID is created, whose only key is Unique I D. You cannot modify this index.

If a file includes an index that permits duplicates, then once the UniqueID flag is set to Yes, the flag cannot be switched to No unless you first delete the index or modify the index so that it does not allow duplicates.

If you reset the UniqueID flag to No, the Unique I D field and the index based on the Unique I D field are removed.

System the file belongs to.

You must first define the system code on the Product Line Definition form.

Prefix for the file name. The 4GL field name for each element in the file consists of the prefix and the element name.

A prefix must be unique within a product line and can be up to three characters long. The Lawson Software standard for naming a file prefix is to use the first three letters of the file name.

Specifies whether attachments, such as comments, are allowed with this file. Comments are useful for linking narrative text to specific data.

Yes creates two attachment files that are related to the attachment-enabled data file and are named as follows:

L_HPrefix

L_DPrefix

where:

• Prefix is the prefix of the data file the attachments are related to

• L_H indicates a header attachment file (the first 512 bytes of the attachment)

• L_D indicates the detail attachment file (the remaining bytes, up to 32,000, of the attachment)

Enabling attachments adds the defined attachment index size to parent file records even if the record has no associated attachments. For information on utilities for working with attachments, see the System Utilities Reference Guide.

After changing this parameter, you can expect dbreorg to take quite some time to process, depending on the number of records that already exist.