Delimited (Free Format) ASCII Files

Restriction: This topic applies to Windows environments only.

Use this format to export data from an XDB Server table or view to a free-format ASCII file. ASCII format is a common means of transferring data from one program to another. Many software applications (including SQLWizard) provide a means of creating and reading ASCII files. There are two ASCII file formats:

Delimited Free Format ASCII Files allow variable field lengths - each field is separated by a field delimiter.
Fixed-format ASCII Files have fixed field lengths - data is arranged in columns. Every record fits into a standard form, so field delimiters are not required.

When you use the Browse button to choose a target file, Export will search for the selected file format. Free format is indicated by the file name extension .fre.

You must specify a field delimiter to indicate where each field ends. The field delimiter differs from the record delimiter. The field delimiter can be typed as keyboard characters or as ASCII decimal codes enclosed in angle brackets. For example, to use a colon for a field delimiter, enter the character : or the string <58>. To use an angle bracket character ( < or > ) as a delimiter, you must enter the ASCII decimal codes <60> or <62>, respectively.

When specifying a delimiter, take care not to use a character found in your data, or in the default masks for the data types in the exported table. For example, do not use a comma as the delimiter if your data contains numeric or money values grouped with a comma. The default delimiter is an @ symbol.

Record Delimiter	Enter a character to be used as the end-of-record delimiter. The record delimiter for standard ASCII files is a carriage-return followed by a line-feed, as indicated by the default <013><010>. You can specify a different record delimiter to handle other file structures. For example, you could specify the field delimiter as <008><010> and the record delimiter as <005><010>.
Quotes	Select the Quotes checkbox if you want character fields in your target file to be enclosed in quotes. When character fields are enclosed in quotes (either double- or single-), any delimiter character found within the quotes is treated as part of the string. For example, if you are using a comma as a delimiter, and your source file contains the string "Washington, DC 20021", the entire string will be treated as one field even though it contains the delimiter character. Note: If your fields are enclosed in quotes, do not use quotes as a delimiter.
Heading	Select this option if you want to insert the column names in the first row of the target file. If you do not want columns names to appear in the first row, deselect the Heading checkbox.